The Great Story of Professor Berkeley Larch
by AwkwardVulpix
Summary: The story of Professor Berkely Larch, and how he defeated the most terrible evil his world has ever known. Contains: Language, violence, intense action.
1. Chapter One: The Adventure Begins

The Great Story of Professor Berkeley Larch

Chapter One

The Beginning

()()()

Sinnoh

200 kilometers outside of the Sinnoh National Air Force Base

Screaming above the wilderness, two jet pilots were completing their practice run of the most recent jet plane developed in Sinnoh, the Pidgeotto F-20.

"This is Red Leader, reporting in. Are we cleared for landing?"

"Yes," replied ground control. "You should be landing in approximately 1 minute, three seconds. Wait, what's that?"

A strange, vaguely plane-shaped object had appeared on the radar.

"What is it?" Asked Red Leader.

"It's…a plane of some sort! And its going at supersonic speeds!"

"Is it one of ours?"

"I've never seen anything like it! Its too small to be manned, and the wings have a really weird shape! Do you have visual?"

"No, I don't see anything."

"How could you not see it? Its coming up right next to you!"

"Is it clo…?" Asked Red Leader, but his question was interrupted in a horrible manner. Whatever the object was, it had managed to slice the entire plane clean in half, along with its pilot.

"We lost Red Leader!" Shouted the controller. "Red Two, get the hell out of there!"

Red Two desperately swerved his aircraft to the left, but it was no use. The unknown object swerved left, just as he did, and sliced off an entire wing with ease. The craft swerved violently out of control, and hit the ground, causing an explosion that would make Michael Bay blush.

"We've lost signal on the bogey," Said the controller, shocked at this recent turn of events.

Meanwhile, near the crash, a man wearing a pinstripe suit, shadowed by the bright conflagration smiled cruelly…

()()()

The Residence of Professor Larch

The Next day

Professor Berkeley F. Larch is truly a unique individual. Generally regarded as a biological genius, though extremely absent-minded. For example, he constantly forgets his middle name. He also occasionally forgets his Pokemon's names, generally just stuttering out random nonsense that does not even vaguely resemble any syllable in them. He is also unique in the sense that his only clothes are lab coats, and nothing else.

But enough about Larch's forgetfulness and dressing habits. After eating dinner from his new, vastly improved thermonuclear microwave, free of any radioactive hazards, he sat down to watch the evening news.

He picked up the remote, switched on the TV, and switched to the KNN, or Kanto News Network, to see what was happening in the world.

"In other news," Said the newscaster, a beautiful women of about twenty-five, "A training exercise in the Sinnoh Air Force went awry today, when a structural failure occured, and two recent planes fell apart. The government has assured us that the design is being reviewed, and this shouldn't happen with the next series of planes." It then cut to an interview with the radar director, talking about what had happened during the training exercise, and some reasons the planes didn't work . It then cut to some other footage, caught by a bystander, that the government didn't actually know existed. The planes were flying normally, when, BOOM, they literally fell apart. The person recording it screamed, dropped the camera, and started running away, before it cut off. Professor Larch thought that something was off, though, in the way it fell apart, and rewound the footage. He paused at the moment of truth, and saw a strange distortion, shaped like something Larch knew well. He said only one word:

"Latias."

()()()

In all of Kanto, only two people have ever managed to successfully capture a legendary. One is Professor Larch, who managed to, after three months of tracking, catch a Shaymin for the purposes of scientific study. The other one is a more typical trainer, John Mathers, who managed to, in one month, capture a Latias. Larch had occasionally talked with him, but they were acquaintances more than anything else.

When Larch saw the outline of the attacker, he immediately grew suspicious. He had made the decision to ask him a few questions.

The house was like any other, nothing special at all, really. Except for the fact that it contained an obscenely powerful psychic dragon thing, that is.

He knocked on the door, humming a tuneless song to himself. Eventually, a tall, passably built man opened the door. He was, more or less, unremarkable. Larch didn't notice, and

"Excuse me, sir?" Asked John, politely.

"Hm? Oh, I didn't notice you opened the door, I apologize. May I come in?"

"Uh, I guess. What do you want?"

"Well, I saw on the news that two jet planes were recently destroyed by an unknown aircraft, that closely resembled a Latias. Care to explain?"

Larch's wild claim was an incredible offense to John's moral integrity, and he burst into a rage-filled tirade against him.

"What! How could you have the nerve to even _insinuate_ that I would abuse this power! You moronic jackass!"

"I wasn't accusing you of anything, my good sir!"

"Okay, okay, I apologize. But I didn't do it!"

"Then perhaps somebody else stole it?"

"Impossible. The PokeBall is on a time lock. Every day, it changes, and even if it was the right time, you still need the ten-digit passcode, which only I know."

"I see. Perhaps it was just a rogue, then. Sorry to bother you!"

After Larch left, John closed the door, and muttered to himself, "Weirdo."

()()()

Having determined that John was a dead end, Larch set to work on his automatic translation device, his greatest invention yet. After two years of study, he realized that the Pokemon language was not based on syllables, like English, but on enunciation of syllables. By connecting his device to a remote computer, he could understand exactly what a given Pokemon was saying, instead of guessing after knowing them for a while.

"Alright, what remains here?"

In fact, very little remained. All he had to do was weld on the cover, and it would be ready to put in his ear.

"Oh, I didn't realize I was so far ahead." he said, pleased.

He picked up a welding torch, and set to work on attaching the cover to the device. Just ten minutes later, he was done.

"Yes!" He cried with ecstasy. "My masterpiece is complete! Rembrandt, get in here, I must test this!"

Rembrandt is what Larch chose to name his Smeargle when he first caught him, because Rembrandt was his favorite Renaissance artist. I would hope that you know what a Smeargle looks like, if you're browsing this section, but if not, it could best be described as a bipedal beagle, with a few key differences: its coloration is off white, with a few brown rings near the wrists, it appears to be wearing a beret, and its tail is effectively a paintbrush.

Eventually, he walked in, curious as to what Larch was on about this time.

"I finished it!" He said, putting the device in his ear. "Go ahead, say something!"

"Uh…what are you talking about?" Said Rembrandt.

"Yes!" Yelled Larch. "It works perfectly!"

"What is it?"

"This is a translation device. I can now understand you with perfect clarity!"

"Oh. Well, now you can really annoy me."

It turns out that Rembrandt thought Larch was an idiot.

()()()

Later…

Undisclosed Location

"Well, John, thank you very much for allowing me to borrow your Latias." Said a man, the same man outside the Air Force base.

"You're quite welcome…uh, what was your name again?"

"That doesn't matter, John. And neither do you."

"What?"

Suddenly, with no warning, hundreds of black tentacles erupted from the mysterious person's back, and grabbed John.

"I said, you don't matter to me anymore."

The dark appendages tore John apart in an instant, before his body could even register pain.

"However, I will keep the Latias for myself."

()()()

Well, this is certainly going to be quite interesting. Review, favorite, I don't care, just show that you like it so far!


	2. Chapter Two: The Mysterious Letter

Chapter Two

The Next Day

Professor Larch's House  
After yesterday's strange events, Professor Larch was barely able to get any sleep at all, since his mind was so filled with questions. Why was John so defensive? If John didn't order his Latias to destroy the planes, who did? Why did he always forget what he was doing? What was he thinking about, again?

Eventually, though, he was able to get to sleep, and dreamt calmly. When he woke up, he noticed something most interesting; an envelope on his bedsheets.

"Hello, what's this?" He picked it up, and tore it open. The handwriting was beautiful; so perfectly symmetrical it seemed as if it was typed. It was especially impressive since it was written in old gothic style.

"Wow, a secret admirer? I wouldn't consider myself to be so lucky."

However, this letter was not from a secret admirer, but somebody that kept blabbering on about "evil" and "fate" and "Unova". Unova? That region was very far away. Now it was getting interesting. He continued reading, and saw that it was an instruction list. He was to take Artie and Rembrandt along with him, and get to Unova by any means necessary in one week. There, he would fight and defeat a terrible evil. He also had to take several PokeBalls, and catch a Pokemon of his choice to add to his team. It was signed, in the most complex writing of all, "Mr. A."

"Well, I had nothing better to do. Artie, Rembrandt, get in here!"

If you haven't read my other story, you wouldn't know that Artie is Larch's Furret. If, for some reason, you decided to browse the Pokemon section without having a clue as to what Pokemon is, a Furret could best be described as being similar to a stoat, except the back has crescent-shaped brown marks, the tail appears as just an extension of the body, and the head is more streamlined. That was a terrible description, I apologize.

Anyway, the story.

"Alright, Artie, surely you know about my latest invention?"

"Uh, no." He said, in a high-pitched sort of chirp.

"Oh, in that case, it's basically a translator device that allows me to understand you perfectly. Fascinating, eh?"

"I…guess?"

"Well, I got this letter, saying that I need to go to the Unova region, capture a new Pokemon, and defeat a great evil, all within a week."

"Unova?" Said Rembrandt. "That's almost a thousand miles away!"

"Then we must go there as soon as possible."

"What do you mean we?" asked Artie. "You nearly killed all of us when you tried to get that Shaymin!"

"Yes, but the key word is 'nearly'. Come on, then, we're off!" He ran out the door, picking up the Shaymin's PokeBall on the way. It was then that he realized he was still wearing his pajamas, and came back inside, quite thoroughly embarrassed. "We'll be off when I get some clothes on."

"We're doomed." Said Rembrandt, recognizing there was absolutely no hope for any of them, if this was the standard they were working with.

()()()

Kanto Airlines

About Noon

Having put on some proper clothing, i.e. a labcoat, Professor Larch was ready to depart. He had taken approximately five thousand…pounds, I suppose, his three Pokemon, and various food supplies, including a specially bred berry that gave a temporary boost in power, but resulted in a sort of crash and this doesn't resemble anything, does it? Yeah, that's blatant, I apologize.

Anyway, he successfully got his tickets from the teller, a woman of about forty, and headed towards the terminal. The flight itself was somewhat roundabout; rather than going directly to Unova, it would be making a stop in Sinnoh, followed by going to Unova.

He was so busy thinking about the strange letter, he didn't notice that he was at the terminal, and walked straight into the wall. Rubbing his nose, he adjusted his trajectory and walked into the actual doorway, showing the guard his ticket.

Professor Larch had only been on a plane once before, when he had to go to a scientific conference in Johto. He didn't really care for it, and slept most of the way…and accidentally slept through the planes next departure, but managed to get off before it _took_ off, thankfully. He was constantly hoping that wouldn't happen again.

Walking down the long, dark hallway leading to the plane, Larch had no idea that somebody, wearing a pinstripe suit, was watching him…

()()()

Quite a bit later…

"Passengers, we are making our final approach." Said the captain. "Please return your trays to the upright position, and buckle your seatbelts.

The passengers did so, except for Larch, because he had fallen asleep. The person next to him, a fat man most people would describe as a "Texan stereotype", due to his attire, bumped his arm, jolting him awake.

"Wha?"

"We're landing, dumbass. Put your tray up and your seatbelt on."

"Oh! Silly me." Larch pushed his tray up, and put his seatbelt on. But it was at that moment that they touched down, and he panicked, hitting the person next to him.

"We have landed, passengers. Please depart immediately."

The passengers unlocked their belts, got up, and headed for the door.

()()()

Later…

Hearthome City

"Ridiculous!" Cried Larch in rage. "Bumped! Me! Of all people!"

Why was he so angry? The explanation is that when Larch attempted to get back on his flight, the incompetence of the company resulted in him being moved to a different flight, two days later.

"What's wrong, sir?" Asked a female voice from behind him.

"Hello?" Larch turned around, and saw a woman of roughly twenty. "Oh. Well, I got bumped off the flight to Unova, and now I have to wait, like, three days or something ridiculous."

"Oh, I see. Yeah, our airport does kind of suck."

They paused in a several minute long, awkward silence.

Finally, the woman broke the ice. "I know what'll get your mind off things!"

Larch already knew her suggestion. "A Pokemon battle? Well, I might as well."

Larch pulled out Rembrandt's PokeBall, and sent him out.

"I must warn you, though, I have developed a translator device that allows me to perfectly understand his speech."

"Well, I must warn you: my team is cute, but it's also tough!"

She pulled out her own PokeBall, one of four, and sent out…you know what? If I describe all of these, we'll be here forever. She had sent out a Mightyena, and if you don't know what that is, Google it.

"Wha…" Larch sputtered. "I thought you said cute, not threatening!"

"Oh, don't worry, Henry's really just a big softie."

"Erm, that doesn't change the fact he could easily claw my face off and proceed to eat me."

Henry seemed appalled at the idea, and backed away from him.

"Okay…I suppose he wouldn't do that. But enough talk; have at you!"

()()()

Next chapter: the thrilling conclusion to the fight against the absent-minded professor, and a woman that thinks terrifying things are cute. This has been your daily dose of AwkwardVulpix, over and out.


	3. Chapter Three: The Battle

Chapter 3

"Have at you!" Cried Larch.

"Wait, don't we have to pick one of us to go first?"

"Oh, right, silly me. Well, since you challenged, I suppose I should get first go."

The woman concurred that this was fair, and Larch gave his first command.

"I shall begin by using Flamethrower!" He shouted in a triumphant manner, even though he just started.

On cue, a jet of red-hot flame burst from Rembrandt's mouth, turning a small patch of sand into glass. Henry panicked, and began running around without aim, his fur on fire. Suddenly, Anne got an idea.

"Henry, tackle him!"

Being on fire, the power of the tackle would be very impressive indeed. In fact, there was something that the woman had disregarded: Smeargle paint contains a specific combination of enzymes and chemicals that is highly flammable, and even explosive in some cases, including Rembrandt's. Neither Henry nor his owner were aware of this fascinating property, and when Henry's attack collided, setting Rembrandt on fire, he began running around in a blind panic, splashing paint everywhere.

"Oh, dear…Rembrandt! Watch out!"

Thankfully for him, Rembrandt was smart enough to avoid the puddles, but Henry lacked this knowledge, and ran directly into one of them, creating a moderately good facsimile of the move Explosion. When the smoke cleared, it was quite evident that Henry had fainted.

"That's alright, Henry. You did good."

She pulled out the only empty PokeBall on her person, and put Henry back in it, converting his mass to a sort of red energy.

However, Rembrandt wasn't looking so hot. Running around from being on fire, and of course, being on fire, had tired him out to a significant degree.

Not to be outdone, Larch's opponent pulled out a second PokeBall, containing an even more frightening creature.

"This one is named Dante!" She said, throwing the device to the ground.

"Dante?" Asked Larch and Rembrandt in unison, recognizing the unfortunate connotations that name carried.

There fears were soon realized, as the Pokemon that emerged was quite frightening; a Houndoom, of all things to be considered cute.

"Okay, there is no way you can honestly consider _that _to be cute." Said Larch.

"Hey, don't be mean!" She yelled, seeing that Dante was hanging his head and backing away, as if he was hurt by Larch's comment.

"Uh…well, I, er, didn't mean it like that!"

"Dante, use a jumping tackle!" Commanded the woman. Dante, having done this maneuver many times before, knew exactly what to do: run a bit away from the main battle, turn back around, and, when sufficiently close to the target, leap up and strike it with his shoulder blade for massive damage.

"I'm doomed." Said Rembrandt, tensing his body in preparation.

Indeed he was, for when the brutal attack hit, he almost immediately passed out.

"Wait, is that even a _move?"_ asked a bewildered Larch. "Oh, never mind. Rembrandt, return!" He pulled out the PokeBall and took back his defeated partner.

"My next choice is…uh…wait, which one has Artie in it?" He asked, holding up two PokeBalls. "I've forgotten."

"Who's Artie?" Questioned the woman.

"Oh, uh, my Furret. I had a mark on his ball, but I had a mark on the other one, and I've forgotten which is which."

"What's in the other?"

Hearing her question, Larch panicked. Should he tell her what was really in it, or make something up? Would she even believe her if he told the truth?

Finally, after sweating out the equivalent of a small puddle, he had his answer.

"It's a Shaymin."

"A what?"

"A Shaymin. It's official status is Legendary, though it is not particularly rare, just extremely elusive. The one I have took me three months to track down and capture."

"Wait, you caught a _Legendary?" _Asked the woman incredulously.

"Yes, but I have no intention to fight with it. It is far too powerful, and it simply wouldn't be any fun for either of us. Now that I think about it," he continued, looking at both containers, "Artie is a good friend, but something of a wimp. I forfeit."

"You…what?"

"I forfeit."

"Oh. Hey, did I ever get your name?"

"Oh, dear me, you didn't! I'm Professor Berkeley Larch."

"I'm Anne." She replied.

"That's certainly an interesting name. Speaking of which, I received a strange letter a while ago, saying that I was to go to Unova to defeat some terrible evil. Care to join?"

"Oh, I'd love to!" Shouted Anne with glee. "It sure is boring around here, defeating evil sounds really interesting!"

"Quite right!" Then, Larch remembered what had happened. "Oh, wait, the flight. Damn."

"Hey, there's a really nice park over there."

"Really?"

"Yeah, you can take your Pokemon for a walk, and they heal any fainted ones."

"Let's go, then!"

_about ten minutes later…_

Entrance to Amity Square.

"It certainly seems nice enough." Larch noted to himself. However, all was not right. A tall, bony man with messy brown hair was sitting outside the entrance, next to a large, green, regal-looking snake. A Jalorda, in other words.

"Oh no, oh no, oh no…" Larch began breathing heavier and heavier.

"What's wrong?"

"I _hate_ snakes."

The man twitched his head, and looked at the pair. "I'll have you know…" he began, pausing between random words and syllables, "I love snake Pokemon. Richmond was my starter in Unova, and he's always been there for me. But now they won't let him in!"

"What? I thought all Pokemon were allowed in Amity Square." Said Anne.

"Not anymore. Now they only let in 'cute' ones!" He twitched his head again, and looked down at his feet.

"What? They can't do that!" Cried Anne in defiance. She stormed up to the entrance of the park, fuming with rage. Inside a booth, an old man was reading a sports magazine.

"Er, Anne, I'll settle this." Said Larch, pushing Anne to the side. "Hello, my good sir, may I be allowed entry?"

"Do you have any cute Pokemon?" He asked slowly, putting down his magazine just a few inches.

"Oh, certainly!" Said Larch, pulling out what he had determined to be Artie's ball.

"What is it?" The man asked, again slowly.

"A Furret!" Said Larch, convince he had won.

"That is not on the list." He said, this time quickly, and snapping back the magazine to his face.

Larch's shoulders sagged. "What? But…" he began to sputter out a bunch of nonsense, before realizing he could still win.

"Surely a Shaymin would be on the list, in the off chance somebody managed to catch one?"

"No."

By now, Larch was sure the list was completely arbitrary. "Okay, what _is_ on the list, then?"

"Buneary, Drifloon…"

"Drifloon!" He interrupted. "Those things kidnap children!"

"If you have an issue with the list, please take it up with the manager."

"And where is the manager, exactly?"

"Right in front of you, trying to ignore you."

"An insult!" Larch yelled. "I won't stand for this at all!"

"Go away, you idiot, I'm trying to read!"

"Oh, forget it, you're a moron anyway." Larch stormed off, much as Anne had earlier.

"Hey…" said the man that liked snakes, just as they were leaving. "Could I come with you?"

Larch began to say no, but Anne slapped her hand on his mouth and said, "Certainly!"

"Thank you." Said the man, getting up. "I'm Ralph."

Larch glared at Anne, before giving their names. "I'm Professor Larch, and this is Anne."

"Oh, those are nice names."

()()()

"Indeed, they are." Whispered a voice in the shadows, listening to their entire conversation. "Larch, you've certainly found yourself a team, but I have so much more…" he giggled to himself, but stopped soon after. "I shouldn't be laughing; you aren't dead yet." He got up from his hiding place, revealing that he was wearing an elegant pinstripe suit…

()()()

Next time: a car chase, because I like those. Also next time, the reveal of the villains identity, and after that, in the second part of the car chase, the conclusion to the Amity Square subplot. This has been AwkwardVulpix, over and out.


	4. Chapter Four: The Attack

Chapter Four

()()()

"I still can't believe it!" Cried Larch, still raging about that whole thing about Amity Square. "Not cute! How dare they!"

"Uh, Berkeley?" Asked Anne, somewhat wary due to Larches anger.

"What?" He snapped.

"Um, there's a Pokemon center up ahead. Do you think we should heal our teams?"

Larch sighed and pinched his nose. "Yes, that's probably a good idea. Unless, of course, they're ridiculously discriminatory too." As he spoke, his voice got progressively more and more sarcastic.

"Are you okay?" Asked Ralph.

"Yes, I'm fine." He sighed again. "I just…don't like it when people discriminate like that. Ridiculous, honest-," his sentence was interrupted when he ran into the door of the center. "Ow." He pulled open the door, and the group walked inside, towards the main counter. None of them saw that a man in an overcoat, sitting in a chair against the far wall was looking at them intently.

Not aware they were being watched, Larch, Ralph, and Anne asked the nurse in front if they could heal the fainted members of their teams.

"Well, of course you can!" She answered, cheerful as possible.

"Good," said Larch, "Just making sure after that Amity Square nonsense."

"Oh, yeah, I know. They wouldn't let my Pokemon in, either. Stupid, huh?"

"Yes, yes, could you heal them?"

"Oh, right." Larch and Anne handed her the PokeBalls, and she put them into a highly specialized container. She closed the lid on it, and pressed a button, filling it with a powerful healing potion, much more powerful than was legal to sell in stores. In seconds, Rembrandt and Henry were both fine.

"Thank you, madam." Said Larch, taking back his Pokemon. "Fascinating, how easy this whole process is nowadays. You had to wait hours just a decade ago."

They turned around and began to leave, but Larch bumped into the man who was watching them, since he had gotten up and began walking to the counter.

"Sorry, sir. I should really look where I'm going." He said, his voice as snide as possible.

"Er, yes." Larch moved out of the way, and finally was able to get out of the building.

The man continued to the counter, and asked the nurse, "Did you put in the gas?"

"Yes, I did."

"Good. Here's the money." He reached under his coat and pulled out a wad of hundreds. "Good work."

He slapped the cash on the counter, and the nurse quickly pocketed it. "Thanks."

"Anytime." He turned tail, and ran outside, to a waiting van.

"Thanks for being a moron, you slimy bastard." She chuckled. "Now I'm rich, and he doesn't get diddly."

()()()

Some time later…

"Well, now what?" Asked Anne.

"I don't know." Replied Larch. He began looking around, and finally saw something most interesting behind him, that none of them had noticed before. "Say, is that van following us?" He asked in turn. All three of them turned around, seeing for the first time that a generic black van had been following them, silently and slowly.

It stopped, and somebody in a pinstripe suit opened the door.

"I think we should run." Noted Ralph, already turning around. Indeed, his course of action was a wise one, because the man coming out of the van had a very large handgun.

"Jesus Christ!" Larch yelled, grabbing Anne's hand and breaking into a run. The man aimed his gun, with only one hand, and began firing, causing many people to panic As anybody that has handled a weapon can attest to, you really need both hands for something, and this was no exception. None of his bullets hit anything living. "Damn it!" he cried.

Ralph had chosen to hide behind a nearby dumpster, and the other two quickly followed suit.

"What do we do?" Larch asked, panting.

"I don't know!" Ralph yelled. It was somewhat poor of him not to have any sort of idea, because the van pulled up to them just then, and the man jumped off.

"Hello, Larch."

"What do you want with me?"

"Oh, just your corpse." He aimed his gun, again with only one hand, and pulled the trigger. Nothing happened. "What the…" He checked, and realized that he was out of bullets. "Damn."

Larch jumped from his spot, and punched the strange man right across the face, distracting him for only seconds. This, however, was enough for all of them to slip by, and get near the van.

"I'll handle this." Ralph said, opening the driver side door, revealing him as the man in the overcoat. The driver was surprised, certainly, having thought that they were dead, but was quickly put out of commission by a pinch to the neck.

"Where did you learn that?" Larch asked, climbing into the back with Anne.

"I watch a lot of movies." Ralph floored the gas pedal, blasting them off, away from the man.

"No!" He cried, slamming his fist on a wall. But, just as soon as he looked up, he saw a possible way he could still win: a car, carelessly parked in the street.

Muttering to himself, he punched through the window and unlocked the door, blasting off an alarm in the process. The owner of the car, though, was nowhere to be seen.

"Oh, shut up." He said. Immediately, the car alarm went dead. He climbed inside, and looked at the dashboard. Placing his finger against the keyhole, a thin tentacle extended from it, and promptly matched itself to fit the ridges. He twisted, and the car started.

"Ha!" He shouted in triumph. "You can't beat me!"

Wasting no time at all, he zoomed off after the group, not aware that somebody had been smart enough to call the police, and a large group of cars was quickly headed towards the scene of the gunshots.

()()()

Unova

Undisclosed location

"Is the bomb ready?" Asked a man in the shadows, to another, working on a strange device.

"Almost." He replied.

"Good." He began laughing aloud. "Soon, the world will know the true power of," he stepped out of the shadows, revealing that he was wearing a pinstripe suit, "Deoxys." He continued laughing, even louder…

To be continued…

()()()

A tad short, to be sure, but worry not! This is a two-part chapter…but my family and me are going to Disneyland for spring break, so the next part may not be up for some time. Anyway, until the big car chase, this is AwkwardVulpix, over and out.


	5. Chapter Five: The Chase

Chapter 5

Last time, on The Great Story of Professor Berkeley Larch…

Somebody has been looking for Larch, and certainly has the resources to get rid of him. However, Larch is certainly clever enough to escape from him, and got into a car chase. Now, the story continues…

()()()

"Well, that was certainly lucky, eh?" Asked Larch. He, Anne, and Ralph naively believed that they had managed to shake off the crazy, well-dressed man shooting at them, and were now home free.

"Yeah, that was pretty lucky of us." Ralph answered, still driving. Although Larch was sitting next to him still, Anne had moved to the back of the van, so she could rest.

"Wait…" Ralph said. He saw something in the corner of his eye, in the sideview mirror. "What is that?" He looked closer, temporarily taking his eyes off the road, and realized it was a car, chasing after them, and fast. "Oh, no." He saw that, not only was a car chasing after them, but the man in the suit was driving it, and to top it all off, a police car was chasing behind that one.

"What?" Asked Larch, worried.

"Uh…I don't think suit guy has given up yet."

A gunshot rang out, fired by the man in the suit, and the police car skidded off.

"And I think he just shot a police officer!"

"Good lord!" Larch yelled. "Hit the gas! Put it into high gear! We're going to be shot!"

Ralph looked at the gear change, but didn't know what it meant, since he didn't do much driving.

"Uh…"

Larch groaned in frustration, grabbed the lever, and put the van into the highest gear it had. Immediately, the engine roared into a violent boost, propelling the van forward.

"Damn!" Yelled the man in the other car. He was so angered, he didn't notice that a man on an evil looking, black motorcycle, wearing a hideous combination of Nazi paraphernalia and Hell's Angels gear was coming down an alley just to the side. Rather than hitting him, though, he sped past, avoiding the biker by literal centimeters.

"Watch we're you're going, you moron!" Shouted the biker, filled with pointless, blind rage, that he lacked the ability to control. He chased off, the fake shrunken heads attached to the exhaust pipe dangling after him.

Meanwhile, the man in the suit was hot in, er, pursuit (sorry about that), muttering to himself various horrific tortures he would put those three morons through. Wait, what? What the hell do you mean, graphic detail, you sick freak? No, before you ask, a mayonnaise is not considered an instrument of torture. No, horseradish is not an instrument of torture either.

Anyway, Captain Pinstripe…you know what, I'll give him a name. "Man in the suit" isn't very threatening. Let's try again.

Anyway, Dave was still chasing after the van, blah, blah, blah, and was so intent on the van, he didn't actually notice when he swerved off the road, directly toward a hot dog stand. When he did notice, he desperately attempted to correct his mistake by swerving in the general direction of the asphalt, but it was no use. The steering column collapsed in on itself, due to the strain, and the wheels locked in place. The person manning the hot dog stand jumped out of the way, and Dave completely destroyed the stand, sending hundreds of cylinders of processed meat product flying every which way…including the biker guy, who had just now caught up.

"What the hell!" he screamed at the top of his lungs. He parked the bike, and walked over to the car. When he saw what the car was, and who was driving it, his rage increased.

"You again! When will you learn to drive, you damn…" his speech degenerated into random gibberish, and he picked Dave up by the neck. He squeezed…

()()()

"Moron," Dave whispered to himself, riding his brand-new motorcycle. "He really thought he could beat _me…_".

Though he had lost some time, motorcycles are infamous for their acceleration and speed, and he managed to make up a large amount of distance in almost no time at all.

However, in a car chase, any lost time could mean a complete loss, and this was no exception. He stopped at an intersection, and started thinking. It seemed Larch had completely disappeared, and Dave was completely lost…until he glanced to the side and saw a massive parking garage.

"There you are, you clever son of a bitch." He kicked against the ground, and headed toward the disturbingly large construction.

()()()

Indeed, Dave's assumption was correct, for Ralph had actually chosen to hide the van inside the parking garage.

"Well, now we seem to be safe." Larch said. He was not aware that it was impossible for him to be more wrong, unless maybe a nuke went off in the city, and that's pushing it.

"I guess." Ralph said. "Hey…do you hear a motorcycle?"

Larch looked in his mirror, and his heart nearly stopped.

"Step on it! He's like the Terminator or something!"

Ralph looked in his mirror, and reflexively slammed the gas pedal as far as it would go. Immediately, the van blasted off, crashing through the cheap metal guardrails on the other side. Luckily, they were on the first floor, and only fell a few feet. Still, Larch passed out from the sheer intensity of the whole ridiculous situation. Anne woke up, and screamed when she realized what was going on.

Not to be even vaguely outdone, Dave popped an impressive wheelie and shot out of the hole in the railing, and promptly did something that Evel Knievel would not even consider thinking about: he got out of the seat, stepped on the handlebars, and jumped off. The motorcycle crashed, completely annihilating it, but Dave managed to land on top of the van, causing a great WHUMP sound.

"What the hell was that?" Ralph yelled. Nothing happened, so he relaxed. Then, Dave slammed himself upside-down into the windshield, scaring Ralph like nothing else. Panicking more than anybody had ever panicked before, he crashed into a generic abandoned warehouse, throwing Dave off of the hood and headfirst into the dark, empty crevasse.

"I got him!" Ralph yelled in triumph, convince that this horrifying man was finally done for. However, Larch's little comment about the Terminator was certainly accurate; Dave would not stop until they were all dead, even with a horrific injury. When he got up, Ralph realized with a start that he was not human. Something was disguising him, and the impact of the hard concrete floor, combined with the shards of broken window, caused his disguise to fall apart, revealing a sickening combination of random blue and orange splotches, along with some human features still remaining.

The right side of his face was completely decimated, showing off an unblinking eye and some sort of bizarre color pattern, along with a strange appendage on the side. His shirt was torn apart entirely, and his body ranged from human skin to orange, with a partial depression in the center of his chest. His left arm had been decimated, too, revealing it as a bunch of crude tentacles. His legs were even less human; just great spikes, jutting out from a tapering hip.

"What the hell are you?" Ralph asked, more terrified than he had ever been in his entire life.

"I am your worst nightmare;" Dave said, his normal, pleasant voice replaced with a hideous, demonic _thing_, "I am Deoxys!"

Ralph would have none of this, and he hit the gas again, pushing the partially destroyed van through the wall, and into the hideous abomination against both God and science. He drove all the way into the other wall, smashing in Deoxys' body. He spat a bit of randomly discolored blood out, and picked up the van by the engine hood. It was no use, though; he was just a clone, and did not have the sheer resilience that the real Deoxys had. His injuries were too great, and he died, dropping the van. Larch jolted awake, and got out.

"Good lord!" He cried. "What in the name of all that is holy is that hideous _thing_?" Seeing Deoxys' partial true form, combined with normal human features was a bit jarring for him, to say the absolute least.

"I think he said his name was Deoxys." Ralph answered, shivering rapidly.

The police car pulled up out front, sirens blaring. A fat, mustachioed man burst in, holding his gun just in case.

"All right, I need to know what the hell is going on here, and I need to know it right…" his voice trailed off when he saw the horrific thing in front of the van. "Oh, Jesus."

"My thoughts exactly," Larch announced. "Whatever this thing is, it should not exist in any way, shape, or form."

"Well…I'm still going to have to take you in for questioning."

"But wait!" Larch yelled, realizing a blatant plot hole. "Weren't you shot?"

"No. I just pretended I was to throw…_that_ off my track."

"Clever."

()()()

Somewhere else…

"Oh, dear." Said the true Deoxys, in his complete human form. "That's not good at all. Larch, old boy, you may be a bigger challenge than I initially expected. No matter." He chuckled. "I can still destroy with the greatest of ease."

()()()

Disneyland kicked ass, by the way. No wonder that place is so popular. California Adventure, on the other hand…the only thing I cared about there was California Screamin'. That park, simply put, did not live up to Walt's vision. Anyway, this has been, after a two-week wait, AwkwardVulpix, over and out.

EDIT: Oh, piss. The site isn't even working properly, so I couldn't upload this chapter until now. Bloody usless site.


	6. Chapter Six: Almost Ready

Chapter 6

The next morning…

Although Anne and Ralph had managed to get to sleep fairly easily, Larch had stayed up the whole night building…something.

Ralph was brushing his teeth, and Anne was reading a book she had taken with her, but Larch was doing something much different: stumbling around in a tired mess.

"Er, Ralph, Anne, could I ask you something?" He asked, his voice barely even hearable.

"Did you stay up _all night?_" Anne asked, horrified.

"Yes, actually, I was up all night, trying to figure out how to build a translator for both of you. Here you are!" He handed them each a device, exactly similar to the one he had in his ear.

"Oh, thank you!" Anne said, putting it in her ear. "How does it work?"

"Well, it works by simpl…" Larch didn't get to finish his explanation, because he fell asleep where he was standing.

"Huh." Said Anne, still wondering what the answer was to her question. "Well, I usually feed my team about now, so…let's see if they work!"

Anne got her bag, and pulled out four PokeBalls, each containing a member of her team. Now, as you may remember, Larch forfeited the battle before she was able to bring out the other two that she hadn't used.

"Wait, there isn't enough room in here." Anne realized, before pressing the buttons. "I think we should go outside." Anne left, leaving Ralph with a sleeping man.

"Hold on!" Ralph yelled after a few seconds, dragging Larch outside.

()()()

The Lobby

"Oh, this is so exciting! I know the guy who managed to translate Pokemon language!"

"Er, excuse me!" Shouted the bellhop just before they left. "I have a package for a 'Berkeley Larch'?"

"Oh, that's him." Anne gestured towards Ralph, still dragging Larch behind him.

"Um…is he alright?" Asked the bellhop worriedly.

"Sort of." Anne said.

"Well, just give this to him." The bellhop picked up a large box, and set it down on the desk.

"I'll be sure to!" Said Anne, running outside.

()()()

The Parking Lot

"Alright, time to see if this works!" Anne said, pointing the incredibly specialized spheres towards the ground, two in each hand. Ralph was also holding his, but he didn't seem nearly as interested. Anne pressed the buttons, releasing four bright rays of energy from each ball, and each materialized into a different, large, somewhat terrifying Pokemon. We already know about Henry, her Mightyena, and Dante, her Houndoom, but we don't know about the other two that she had: an Arcanine, named Alfred, and a Charizard, (which is actually the one she started off with) named…Bill.

"It's getting a little cramped in there…" Bill noted, Anne understanding what he said perfectly.

"Oh…oh my god." Anne was incredulous; Pokemon really had their own language?

"I quite agree." Dante said, in a posh British accent.

And on top of having their own language, it was universal amongst them?

"Wow." Ralph whistled, and sent out his Pokemon. His Serperior, Richmond, we already know of, but he also had a Seviper and an Arbok, named Leonard and Carl respectively.

"Ah, what a fantastic day!" Richmond said.

"Oh, this is impossible."

"What is?" Asked Bill.

Anne stepped in and answered his question. "We can understand every word you're saying."

"Whoa, seriously? Epic!" Henry said, his voice sounding like some sort of Californian thing.

That was when Larch woke back up.

"Wow, what happened…_good lord!" _Larch was absolutely terrified of snakes, so as you can imagine, having three in front of him at once was not the most pleasant experience.

"Get those…_things_ away from me!" Larch cried, pointing towards the three snakes.

"What?" Leonard said, sounding as hurt as is theoretically possible to be.

"I'm sure he didn't mean it!" Said Carl.

"Of course I meant it, you evil…thing!"

"Berkeley!" Anne interrupted. "I would really expect better of you! They're living, breathing creatures and deserve your respect!"

"Well…oh, good lord, that's not usually like me…what happened? Wow, I apologize, I've never done something like that before…" He was clutching his head, as if he had a violent headache.

Leonard heard precisely none of this vague apology, though, and ran…excuse me, slithered off, coming as close to crying as a snake could get.

"Oh, great job, asshole." Anne said. They both looked to Ralph, who was just staring meaninglessly at his remaining two Pokemon.

"Ralph…" Anne started, "Are you all right?"

Ralph continued staring for a few moments, before running over to Larch and punching him violently in the face.

"You bastard son of a bitch!" He screamed, pushing Larch to the ground and grabbing his shirt. He began flinging him up and down, tears in his eyes, and saying how Leonard, Carl, and Richmond were the only things to ever care about him, and he drove one of them away.

"Ralph, get off of him!" Anne cried in terror, pulling him away.

Larch wasn't looking very good; his nose was bleeding profusely, his shirt was half ruined, and his glasses were crooked.

"Are you all right?" Anne asked.

"I hope not." Ralph muttered under his breath. He started walking back to the room, keeping his head down and saying a grand total of nothing.

"I can't feel my nose." Larch complained, getting up from the ground.

"No wonder; that was a really good hit. Anyway, you got this package today."

Anne handed him the box, and he tore it open. The contents were surprising: a well-made knife, and a letter, of the same calligraphy and parchment of the original letter.

"What's this say?" Larch adjusted his glasses, and began reading.

" 'To Mr. Larch:

That half-person you killed was not the evil I was speaking of. The evil I did tell you about has the ability to create infinite clones of himself, and that was a clone. The real evil will not be so easy. This knife, as far as I know, is the only thing capable of destroying him for good.

Sincerely, Mr. A.' "

"So…this knife is the only thing that can do the job." Anne noted.

"Quite. And…about the snake…I really feel we ought to do Ralph a favor and find him."

"As Tonto said, 'What you mean "we", white man?' "

Larch scowled. "Oh, fine." He pulled out Rembrandt's and Artie's respective PokeBalls, and sent them out.

"What is it?" Artie asked, stretching out his neck.

"Ow…" Rembrandt said. Although he had recovered from the fight with Anne's devastating team, he was still a bit sore.

"Sorry about that." Said Dante. "No hard feelings, right?"

"Yeah, sure."

"Well, to answer Artie's question, I want to both to start looking for a missing Seviper. He should answer to the name of, ah…"

"Leonard." Finished Carl.

"Thank you." Said Larch. "Well, go on then, we don't have much time to lose! I'll begin asking around. Oh, and, er, he went that way." Larch gestured in the general direction of where Leonard had gone, and they all ran off, shouting off his name.

"What a great twit." Richmond said. "While I do hope that Leonard returns, I also hope that Larch fellow is seriously injured somehow."

"So…" Anne started, "Why did Leonard run off like that?"

"He is similar to Ralph, in that the slightest insult could make him feel completely unwanted. And make no mistake, Larch's little speech was _not_ slight."

"Yeah. I hope he's okay."

"We all do." Said Carl. "We all do."

()()()

Well, that's certainly some emotional turmoil for everybody! And not only that, but Larch has acquired the only thing that can destroy Deoxys? Will he be able to remember where he left it? Will Leonard return? Will Ralph punch somebody else in the face and go berserk on him or her? Find out next time, on The Great Story of Professor Berkeley Larch! This is AwkwardVulpix, over and out!


	7. Chapter Seven: Revealing the Teams

Chapter Seven

Last time on Berkeley Larch…

After staying up all night constructing two other translators for the newest additions to his quest, and as a result, was not exactly a happy camper. When Ralph, an off-putting man who likes snakes, revealed his team, Larch exploded, and drove away Ralph's Seviper, named Leonard. Ralph attacked him, and now, Larch, with the help of his team, must track down the snake, and get Ralph one of his few friends back.

()()()

Although Larch, Artie, and Rembrandt had all left in search for Leonard, Anne stayed behind, justifying that she had zero cause as to Leonard's departure. After they left, she walked over to the remaining snakes, Richmond and Carl.

"Do you think he'll be alright?" She asked, worried for the poor creature.

"Oh, he'll be fine, I'm sure." Richmond said, not sounding sure at all. "At least, I hope he will be."

Anne nodded. "Me too. Do you think I should…talk to Ralph?"

"I don't know, maybe." Said Carl. "He seemed pretty beat."

"Why do you hang out with that guy?" Asked Henry.

"Who, Ralph?"

"No, the science dude. He seems like a complete…"

"Henry!" Anne interrupted. "It's not nice to make fun of people."

"Well, he deserved it!" Henry whined.

Anne had to stop and consider this statement for a moment. Did he deserve that? No, she eventually decided. He did, at the very least, do something to help Ralph out. Speaking of Ralph, she remembered she wanted to talk to him, and ran back inside.

()()()

While Anne was heading for Ralph, Larch had immediately headed to a busy-looking street, asking people if any of them had seen a Seviper. Not any single one of them had recalled seeing one passing by, and he continued asking after each failure. After about five minutes of trying this, he gave up in exasperation, exclaiming that this was entirely pointless, and sat down on a bench. Soon after, another man, tall, fat, pale, and wearing a plaid shirt sat down next to him.

"Hello, sir. I suppose there isn't any point in asking you if you've seen a Seviper, is there?" Larch asked, already knowing the answer.

"No, I haven't." The overweight man pointed his hand at Larch's neck. "Nighty-night, pretty boy." He said, before hitting Larch with a small dart, shot out of a wristwatch.

A woman passing by, not hearing his pathetic attempt at a one-liner, gave him an odd look, but he quickly saved face by claiming that Larch was incredibly drunk. He wrapped his arm around him, and started carrying him towards a black van.

()()()

A few minutes before Larch had been kidnapped, Anne had reached the room they had rented out, and walked in.

"Ralph?" Anne asked, looking around the room for him. "Are you all right?"

"Go away." He said, sounding like it came from the side room. It also sounded like he had been crying.

"Ralph, I want to talk to you."

"I don't."

"Please?" Anne was not about to let Ralph deny her attempts to help; she hated seeing anybody depressed.

"Fine." Ralph said. He opened the door, and Anne saw what he had become; his face was red, his cheeks wet, and his head hanging down like a pathetic, wilting plant.

"Wow…you must really be sad about this."

"No duh, Sherlock."

They stood staring at each other for a few moments, before Ralph completely broke down. He got on his knees, and began crying at Anne's feet, barely able to say how his Pokemon were the only things that ever really cared about him.

"It's okay, Ralph. We can talk about it. Come on, get up."

Ralph did not comply with her request, so she kneeled and picked him up by the shoulder.

"It's going to be okay, Ralph. It's going to be okay…"

Before you ask, the answer is automatically no.

()()()

Compared to Larch, Artie made even less progress. He barely got three feet into a forest before he noticed something no Furret could resist: a shiny object.

"Ooh!" He said, getting excited already. He ran over to the object, and picked it up. He didn't recognize what it was; it seemed to be some sort of sphere, with a bunch of lines cut into it. Of course, as long as it was shiny, he didn't really care what it was, so he started bouncing it around. Almost immediately, a large cloud of greenish gas poured out of it, and he passed out.

"Target fainted," came a voice, hiding in the bushes, "move in and take him."

A small group of people came out of their hiding places, and grabbed him, taking him towards a black van…

()()()

Whereas Artie and Larch had failed miserably in their attempts to find Leonard, Rembrandt actually made a bit of progress. He simply followed the snake tracks, which, by simple logic, would lead him right to the snake eventually. However, after about a hundred feet, he noticed something wrong. The tracks had gone crazy, thrashing around in a manner resembling a seizure. Above that, there were human footprints all around, implying…

He had no time to think about the implications, though. A man with a club leaped out of the bushes, intending to do significant harm to the Smeargle. Rembrandt leaped out of the way, and the man crashed to the ground, smashing his nose with his own weapon.

"Agh!" He cried, blood pouring out. "Die, you little…"

This fic is rated T, so I don't want allow him to finish that sentence. Rembrandt promptly did a double kick right into his gut, completely knocking the wind out of the fellow. He fell to the ground, heaving.

"Who are you working for?" Rembrandt demanded, seeing that the man was wearing a translator similar to the one that Larch had invented. How he got that, he didn't know. When he didn't answer, Rembrandt slapped him and asked again.

"Deoxys." The man said. Rembrandt recoiled in shock. He didn't know why, but that name sounded hideously wrong to him.

"We've already captured everybody else. There's nothing you can do." The man passed out.

Rembrandt realized what must have happened, and immediately began running back to the hotel.

()()()

"Yeah, my mom was kind of a psycho," Ralph said, "She never really let me leave the house. But one night…I ran away. I went to the nearest lab, and that's how I got Richmond."

Somebody knocked on the door. "Housekeeping!"

"Don't come in, please, we're busy."

The supposed housekeeper would have none of that, though. He kicked the door in, and pointed a gun at Anne and Ralph.

"What the hell?" Ralph screamed.

"Come with me, right now!" The gunman demanded. "You don't have a choice!"

Oh, but they did. Rembrandt had gotten to the motel just in time, and delivered a devastating blow to the back of the man's head. He passed out, but he fired the gun in shock, destroying a lamp and prompting a scream from Anne and Ralph both.

"Rembrandt, what the hell is going on?" Ralph asked, terrified.

Rembrandt was quite significantly out of breath, though. "You have to come with me. Larch and all of the other Pokemon have been kidnapped by somebody!"

"What?" Anne questioned, horrified. "Not Henry!"

Ralph screamed. "How much do I have to lose today!" he cried towards the heavens.

"Oh, come on, Ralph, we can still save them. I hope we can, at least…"

Anne slapped Ralph into his senses, and all three of them ran off, hoping that they could save Larch and all of their Pokemon before the worst happened…

()()()

Ho ho ho! A cliffhanger! Yep, I've had my main character get kidnapped. Anyway, I've set a new goal: reach thirty thousand words with this story. P.S., it won't just involve Deoxys. Also, I apologize for not uploading sooner. The login wasn't working for some reason. Blah, blah, blah, this is AwkwardVulpix, over and out.


	8. Chapter Eight: Kidnapping!

Chapter 8

Last time, on Berkeley Larch…

Kidnapping! Intrigue! Interrogation! Convenience!

Okay, maybe not intrigue, but the other stuff was all true. Especially the part about convenience…

()()()

When we left Anne, Rembrandt, and Ralph, they were running blindly out of the motel, hoping they could do something about Larch's kidnapping.

"Wait!" Ralph shouted, stopping Anne and Rembrandt dead in their tracks.

"What?" The other two asked.

"We have no idea where we're even going, do we? I mean, the people that kidnapped them could be _anywhere_ on the island by now."

"Oh…" Anne said, dejected. The island was huge; they would never be able to find where he was in time.

"Actually," A cold, sharp voice said from behind them, "The people that kidnapped him happen to be right behind you three."

Anne and Rembrandt turned around, whereas Ralph was already facing them. The voice had apparently come from a man in an impeccable pinstripe suit; in fact, it seemed to be the same man that had chased after them in the van. Behind him were at least ten people, pointing very large assault rifles at them. Five more were protecting a black van. Floating above them was…something shaped vaguely like a miniature jet plane, with a black aura around it.

"That's…not possible," said Ralph, "You were dead!"

"That wasn't me, idiot. That was a clone of me." The man replied.

"Anyway, you're probably wondering just who I am. Did Larch tell you about the letter he received?"

"Yeah…" Anne said.

"Well, I'm the evil it speaks of."

Anne gasped, while Ralph and Rembrandt stared aghast.

The man turned around, and told his small army to bring out Larch.

The five guarding the van went to the back and opened the door, yelling at the captive to get out. Slowly, a heavily bruised Larch clambered out and walked over to them. The soldiers told him to give them Rembrandt, but he was somewhat reluctant. An assault rifle being stuck in his nostril, however, made him see their way.

"Are…are you okay?" Anne asked, worried about the state he was in.

"No." He replied.

"Honestly, though, Larch, I'm impressed that your friends couldn't tell when to just give up. They'll certainly be useful in my army."

"Erm," Anne interrupted, "What is that?" She gestured towards the floating object.

"That, my dear, is a Latias." Answered the man. "The reason it is darkened is because, well, I'm mind-controlling it."

"That's horrible!" Anne cried.

"Oh, cry me a river. Honestly, humans are absolutely pathetic."

He came to a realization: he was wasting time.

"Enough of this nonsense!" He yelled. "All of you, get in the van!"

They recognized that they had precisely zero choice in this matter. Reluctantly, they walked to the van, and got inside. Anne immediately noticed that there were shelves lining the inside walls, each of them having several PokeBalls. One of the soldiers placed Rembrandt's in the solitary empty space.

"Berkeley, what are these?" Anne asked.

"Ours. There's Artie." He gestured towards one of the balls on the left shelf.

"What are they doing with them?" Ralph asked.

"I don't know. They'll probably kill us and…"

"Make them a part of my army." Finished the man, who had climbed into the back of the van with them.

"I was going to say use them in experiments, actually."

"Well, you would have been wrong, then. Let me tell you a couple of things, Larch." The man chuckled. "First of all, there is no possible way you could ever defeat me. Not only do I have a small army of specially trained soldiers, not to mention at least three brainwashed legendaries, _and_ I can also actually see just a little bit into the future. I knew you would piss Ralph off before it happened, which is why I could set up those traps and kidnap you idiots. However, I hadn't anticipated that Rembrandt would be an idiot and try to delay the inevitable."

"Anyway, I don't have a whole lot of time on my hands right now, so I'm going to send you directly to my complex."

"Isn't it in Unova, though? How can you cross an ocean in a van?"

"That letter you received was quite wrong, Larch. Whoever 'Mr. A' is, he only knew about that complex. I have duplicate complexes in every one of the nations. Goodbye, Larch." The man opened the door and left, leaving Larch, Anne, Ralph, and all of their Pokemon to their fates.

Two soldiers climbed in, sitting in the only two proper seats. The driver put his key in the appropriate slot, turned it, and drove off.

"Well, I guess this is it." Larch said. He thought he recognized a situation where there was no possible way to survive. He was quite thoroughly wrong. In fact, Ralph was already formulating a plan in his head, one that, hopefully, wouldn't fail…

()()()

Ah, damn, this is the shortest thing I've ever published. Sorry, guys, I've just felt like crap these past few days, and couldn't think of anything. Anyway, here's another stupid cliffhanger, and until the conclusion, this has been AwkwardVulpix, over and blah, blah, blah.


	9. Chapter Nine: Rescue

Chapter Nine

Many hours later…

None of them had any idea where they were anymore. They had been driving for a very long time, and were still in Kanto, but that was all that they knew.

The van they were in was utterly Spartan in its interior. Two chairs at the front, and some shelves for holding PokeBalls, that was it. There wasn't even a glove compartment.

"We're here." Said the soldier that was driving, putting on the parking brake outside of a cheap abandoned warehouse. He, along with everybody else, did not know that Ralph had actually been formulating a plan the entire drive, while Larch and Anne simply wondered how they would be killed.

The stop was the perfect opportunity for Ralph's plan to go into action. Faster than either soldier could react, he jumped to his feet and punched the one in the passenger seat directly in his temple, knocking him out instantly. The other guard did not get off easily; in fact, his fate was somewhat worse, as Ralph chopped him in the neck and slammed his face into the wheel repeatedly, blasting off the horn. A passing couple looked at the van, which was shaking violently. Shocked, they immediately speedwalked away from it.

The wheel soaked in blood, Ralph determined that he had done enough. He turned around, and saw that Larch and Anne were staring at him in shock.

"What?" He asked. "Didn't I just save us?"

()()()

After that little adventure, they gathered their things together and got out of the stuffy, cramped van.

"Well, that was fun." Anne said, with noticeable sarcasm in her voice.

"Yeah. I think we should let our Pokemon out, right?" Ralph said.

The other two nodded in agreement, and at once, released their teams, except for Larch, still quite hesitant to release his Shaymin.

"Ow." Henry said.

"What did they do to you?" Anne asked, worried about her team's well being.

"I think they hit me with a wrench."

Anne was furious. How _dare_ they attack an innocent creature like that! She clenched her fists, gritted her teeth, and said, "Let's kill". She gestured for her team to follow her towards the warehouse.

"Er, Anne, let's not do anything rash!" Larch insisted, his voice shaking.

But there was simply no stopping Anne on the warpath. She gave a command to Bill and Dante, and they cleared their throats.

"What on earth is she doing…" Larch asked, giving voice to what all of us were thinking. Within moments, he had an answer. Bill and Dante opened their mouths and simultaneously released a massive burst of white-hot flame, setting a large portion of the front of the building on fire.

"Good lord, Anne, have you gone mad!" Larch screamed, running towards her. However, he had to stop due to the incredible heat of the rapidly spreading conflagration. Inside the warehouse, scientists were screaming, trying to protect their work and, more importantly, the device inside. Anne was slowly walking away, as Bill and Dante gave even more heat to the fire. When she got to the van, she yelled at them to stop and get away from the warehouse, and then walked around to the back of the van.

"Anne, what are you doing?" Larch asked, frightened for his safety. Anne gave no answer and opened the door.

"Anne, please, tell me, what on earth are you planning to…" Larch figured out what she was going to do, and gasped in the greatest horror. There were two containers of gasoline in the back of the van, which Anne picked up.

Larch grabbed at her shoulders and desperately insisted she rethink her course of action. She shoved him away and continued her insane mission.

When she got near enough to the fire, she set down all but one of the containers, and threw that one towards it. When it landed inside, it set a cheap wooden column on fire very quickly, and the flaming gasoline was not helping either.

"You're going to get yourself killed, Anne!" Larch insisted.

The roof of the warehouse collapsed, shutting him up. He fell to the ground, but quickly got back up, and ran away screaming. Anne threw in the other containers, and followed Larch's suit, running away from the extremely dangerous conflagration. The device inside caught fire, and blew up in a deafening explosion, so powerful as to throw everybody in the vicinity to their feet, and temporarily deafen them…

()()()

"Hm." Said Deoxys, clearly worried about something. Most of the soldiers had left, but one remained.

"What?" The last soldier asked him.

"I can't help but feel that something just went horribly, horribly wrong."

Although he didn't know what exactly went wrong, he soon confirmed his suspicions that _something_ had gone wrong. A sharp pain hit his chest, relatively sharp though. Considering his great power, pain was practically unknown to him.

He gave a bizarre, distorted cry, and crumpled to the ground pathetically, clutching his chest.

"Holy…boss, are you okay?" The soldier asked, temporarily losing his nerve.

"Gah! What's happened to me?" Deoxys wondered aloud, climbing back up to his feet. The pain had subsided, but he still didn't know why.

Then he realized what must have caused it, due to the large "boom" he just heard.

"The device!" He cried. The device was connected to his own life force, and if one was destroyed, just a little bit of him was destroyed as well. However, that was not the most important device there was. The most important one was in Unova, where Larch was heading.

"What about the device?"

"It's…it's been destroyed."

()()()

Larch's ears were ringing violently, and he wasn't entirely sure where he was. However, he did know that his glasses had fallen off. He started reaching around for them, but couldn't find them. His vision was very fuzzy, and he couldn't see anything without them.

He attempted to get to his feet, but his balance was significantly off. He tried to look around, but he couldn't make out anything except the vague outline of…a fire? Suddenly, he realized what happened. Anne had gone crazy and committed arson on a warehouse. He walked forward, slowly, and heard a crunching sound under his foot.

"Damn!" he shouted. The ringing was going away now, enough for him to recognize the sound of breaking glass and metal.

A low moaning sound came from the left.

"Who's there?" He realized it could have only been Ralph, though, and asked "Are you alright?"

"What happened?"

"Anne snapped and blew up the building."

"My head hurts…"

"Mine does as well."

Larch suddenly remembered something: due to his forgetfulness, he always had an extra pair of glasses at the ready in the event of loss or destruction. He began patting around himself, and eventually found what he was looking for: an oblong container, holding a pair of glasses.

"Here we are!" Larch shouted in triumph, taking them out. He put them back on, and started looking around for Anne.

He found her relatively quickly, pouring more gasoline onto the roaring fire.

"Anne, you've gone mad! The warehouse has already been destroyed!"

"I'm just making sure!" She ran out of gas, and threw the canister away.

"Well, now we're going to get arrested. Great job."

"Hey, they were breaking more laws!"

"And now all of them have run away, and you've destroyed any proof that there was ever…something…there." He had noticed the wreckage of the device inside, and it was quite an impressive wreckage. Hundreds of wires and tubes were leading away from a gigantic cylindrical thing that had blown its top off.

"What the hell is that?" Asked Ralph, holding his head and running towards them.

"I…don't know." Answered Larch. "Could that be the device he was going on about?"

"It looks dangerous." Anne said.

They heard sirens in the distance.

"Damn it, Anne, you've doomed us all! Everybody hide!"

They all dived into the bushes, and waited for the police car to pass…

()()()

Well…that was certainly eventful, eh? Yeah, I thought I should make it up to you after last week's lackluster chapter, so I burned something down. Anyway, until next time, this is AwkwardVulpix, over and out.


	10. Chapter Ten: The Beginning

Chapter Ten

This chapter is going to be…different. Just a heads up for you guys. In fact, it's generally meant as a sort of prologue to the story. It's going to make more sense as you read, trust me.

()()()

25 million years ago…

It was the beginning, although it was after the end. Three men, normal people from Earth, had discovered a way to protect themselves from the heat death of the universe. However, that was a very long way off, and thus, they had plenty of time to create a plan.

After the universe died, they lost their human forms, but they knew that this was a great thing. They basically became clouds of amorphous matter, able to think, able to move. Able to create.

However, they did not know what they should do for some time, instead just creating random galaxies, until one of the three, named Sangot, had an epiphany.

"My brothers," He said, floating through the spiral arms of a copy of the Milky Way Galaxy. "I have an idea for the creation of life in this glorious universe of ours."

"What?" Asked another, named Santo.

"We shall first create a planet; capable of supporting life, as our old planet supported us.

"And then?"

"We shall make creatures; powerful, intelligent creatures. And then, we will perfect upon the designs, and make even greater creatures, that shall rule in our absence. And then, we will recreate mankind, to build a new, glorious civilization."

"It will take a long time, Sangot." Noted the third, final, and most powerful of all, named Sanreal.

"Yes, but it will be worth it."

"I agree with Sangot." Santo stated.

"Very well." Sanreal reluctantly agreed. "I shall construct a planetary system worthy of holding life. Sangot, Santo, you begin creating your life forms."

()()()

22 million years ago…

Sanreal was right; it had taken a long time. But they had completed the first phase of the glorious project. They had a beautiful planet, and many creatures to populate it. The creatures were very powerful, and could survive nigh on anything, but Sangot still wished to improve.

"Now," Sangot said, "We shall perfect even upon these designs, and create rulers for this world, to ensure that peace shall reign."

"That seems dangerous, Sangot." Sanreal warned.

"Worry not, brother," Santo said. "We shall create an even greater ruler for them, a representation of all of us."

"Very well."

They looked at their creations that already existed, and for a very long time, studied their designs, and slowly perfected upon them…

()()()

20 million years ago…

"Behold, my brothers," Sangot said, "It is done."

Although their numbers were few, the new creations were so powerful that they could defeat everything else tenfold. True to Sangot's word, there was one amongst them that lived in a great hall, who had all the knowledge and almost the power of all of them.

"But there is work to be done still," Sanreal said. "We must recreate Man and Woman, and allow them to preside where our representation cannot."

"That is wise." Santo said.

"We shall give Man and Woman our knowledge; the knowledge to control, the knowledge to live in harmony with nature, the knowledge to use the land given to them to their, and all their brothers and sisters, advantage."

Thus, they began creating Man and Woman. But as long as they were working on him, Sangot couldn't help but feel that they had still failed in their attempt to create a perfect life form…

()()()

19.5 million years ago…

"Behold, my brothers!" Sanreal shouted in glorious triumph. "I give you…Man and Woman!"

They all looked at their most beautiful creations. They watched as they observed the behaviors of their other creations. They watched as they observed the movement of the Sun, the Moon, and the stars. They watched as Woman gave birth to three children. When the original Man and Woman died, they watched as their children built a dirt hut, to protect themselves from the wilderness. For thousands upon thousands of years, they watched as Man and Woman changed their tactics. Eventually, they discovered how to start a fire, to warm themselves during the cold months. Eventually, they populated the whole of the small island that they constructed, and a small group of them left to find other places to live. But Santo and Sanreal did not know that as Man was constructing an empire, Sangot was constructing a physical body for himself. He had been studying all of their creations, and determined that they had not yet created a perfect being…

()()()

15 million years ago…

And then, Sangot was done with his blasphemous creation. It had enough power to easily crush even their earthly representation, which Man decided to call Arceus. And when the body was done, he put his soul into it, and awoke. But somebody was watching him; Santo.

"Brother!" He cried, "What are you doing!"

"Away, you fool. We have not created the perfect form of life. I have."

"What do you speak of, Sangot!"

"Away!" With his incredible power, Sangot directed the energy within just three molecules of oxygen, and fired it in the form of a beam from his chest. Santo fled, fearing for his own life.

"And now, I shall rule. I am no longer Sangot. I am better than Sangot. I will give myself a new name…Deoxys. That is perfect."

And he flew towards the Earth, and destroyed a small village of people.

"Behold!" He shouted. "I am your new ruler!" His voice was so great, that it could be heard on the other side of the planet. "Bow down before the power of Deoxys!"

And they did. Within a single day, Deoxys had managed to take control of the entire planet, and enslave them all to serve his mad whims. Santo dared not intervene, knowing that Deoxys' power was greater than his own, and could easily crush him.

But Sanreal did do something to intervene. He told a small group of hidden people a secret: how Deoxys could be stopped. And over the next thousand years, they worked on it…

()()()

14.9 million years ago…

Deoxys had not anticipated there was a way that he could be stopped, but there was. The hidden colony had devised a chamber that could permanently keep him in cryostasis, and prevent him from awaking ever again.

After they managed to freeze him permanently, they created a great underground chamber to hide him away inside. But they knew that if any one of them had knowledge of this chamber, they could free him, and reawaken his insane regime.

"We must never speak of Deoxys again." Said the leader. "In fact, all knowledge of Deoxys must be erased. We must devise a way to revert humanity back to its original intelligence, to completely ensure that Deoxys' name will never again be known."

The rest of them nodded solemnly. It would be a great sacrifice to eliminate all of their knowledge, but they knew it had to be done. Besides, if they had managed to create civilization, they could surely do it again…

()()()

14 million years ago…

It had been done. All human knowledge and indeed, all real knowledge had been erased completely. It made Sanreal sad to see his creations reverting to such a primitive state, but he knew it was necessary for the good of all mankind.

But the device had not worked perfectly. There was a tiny flaw that allowed Deoxys' soul to escape. He determined that if he could be stopped, something was horrendously wrong, and he was not yet perfect. Thus, for many millions of years, he pored over every inch of his genes, removing ones he found to be needless, and replacing them with perfected ones. It took a very, very long time to even perfect one strand; entire generations passed during the perfection of a single strand.

But the other device, the one that would eliminate all knowledge, also had a flaw. Whereas Deoxys had been erased from the conscious, the subconscious still retained him, and feared him…

()()()

1 million years ago…

Deoxys reawakens without the knowledge of anybody, having determined his genes to be perfected to the fullest extent possible. He could manipulate the fission of any atom, and use its devastating energy to destroy anything. He could take any form he so chose, and create an infinite army of himself.

And he began planning. A great machine, one on each of the five major continents of this land, that could bring everything, even Sanreal, under his control.

()()()

500,000 years ago…

Deoxys begins construction of the first machine, on Unova.

()()()

100,000 years ago…

Humans now populate all continents.

()()()

10,000 years ago…

Construction of the first machine is complete.

()()()

1,000 years ago…

Construction on the final machine begins.

()()()

100 years ago…

Final machine is constructed; Deoxys begins assimilating people into his temporary army.

()()()

49 years ago…

Berkeley Larch is born in Pallet Town Hospital.

()()()

Two days ago…

Sanreal discovers what happened, and selects three heroes to stop Deoxys before the entire world has been enslaved under him.

()()()

Well, there's a general backstory. Certainly a fascinating theory as to how the Pokemon world came about, eh? Well, until the story continues next time, this has been AwkwardVulpix, over and out.


	11. Chapter Eleven, Part One: Home Stretch

Chapter Eleven, Part One

"Have you gone mad, Anne!" Larch screamed after the cop had passed them, and they had confirmed their Pokemon were intact and recalled them. "You could have gotten us all killed!"

"Nobody hurts my team!" She responded.

"You nearly got them all incinerated, you bloody idiot!"

"I don't think you can 'incinerate' a fire type! Besides, I destroyed that damn machine he had in there!"

"That doesn't matter! The point is…"

They continued on for a few minutes, bickering at each other, before Ralph put in his two cents.

"Will both of you _please shut the hell up!"_ He shouted.

They didn't hear him.

"Morons. Come on, guys." He released Richmond and Carl, reasoning that Leonard probably need some rest, and started walking away, both of the snakes following suit, but he came to a realization:

"I have no idea where the hell I am."

He would have asked Larch or Anne if they had a clue, but they were too busy yelling at each other. His team probably had even less of an idea, considering they had been locked up the entire journey.

"Well, we may as well just walk around until we find something."

"Ahem." Said Richmond.

"Sorry."

While Larch and Anne bickered some more, Ralph walked away, his team slithering behind him.

()()()

Quite a while later…

Eventually, after what seemed like hours of walking, Ralph came across a small town. Somebody was sleeping on a bench next to a dirty sign saying "Pallet Town".

"Hello, sir?" He asked.

The man didn't answer.

"Hello?" He asked again, just a little bit louder.

The man got up, revealing he was holding a large assault rifle. "You're coming with me, pretty boy."

"Oh, not this crap again." Ralph muttered.

He put his hands up, recognizing a lost cause, and walked with the man towards a helicopter that was waiting.

"You lot, too." He gestured towards the three snakes, and they reluctantly followed him.

"Where are the others?" Asked the pilot, when the two other men got inside.

"I don't know; he's alone."

"Shouldn't we at least look for the other two?"

"No; they'll just come to us." He sat in the front copilot seat and put on a gas mask, as did the pilot. "Say good night!"

He pulled out a small canister and opened it, revealing a large amount of knockout gas.

Ralph, and all of his Pokemon, fell asleep, and the helicopter took off…

()()()

"Your grandfather has absolutely nothing to do with this, Anne! You did something incredibly stupid, and that's that! Your mother's…"

"Father's, actually."

"Who cares, honestly! It doesn't matter who he is, he did absolutely nothing!"

They heard the incessant chop of helicopter blades, stopped shouting, and looked up to see a black, heavily armed helicopter flying towards them.

"What is that?" Anne asked.

"There they are!" The pilot shouted. He pushed down on a button located above the steering column, which fired off the .40 caliber machine guns mounted on the front.

"Good lord!" Anne and Larch shouted simultaneously. They ducked behind a ruined portion of concrete wall, but they knew it wouldn't last long.

"What do we do?" Anne asked in desperation.

"There's only one thing to do."

He pulled out a PokeBall whose button looked slightly different from the standard.

"What is that?" Anne questioned him.

"Ever wanted to see a Shaymin?" Larch responded. He pointed the ball at the ground, and pressed the button. Said button scanned his finger, and recognizing the correct pattern within a decent margin of error, released the very special Pokemon inside of it: a small, grassy, white hedgehog.

"Whoa." Anne was dumbfounded; she hadn't entirely believed that Larch had managed to catch one, but the proof was nibbling at her leg.

"I'm not entirely done." Larch reached inside his coat and pulled out a pink tiger lily, better known as a gracidea flower. He gave it to the wonderful creature, and it underwent a transformation into the Sky Forme, which is very difficult to describe, unfortunately. I suppose it's sort of like a reindeer, except…you know what, no. A Smeargle was hard enough, but when we start talking about _legendaries_, I don't think Shakespeare could do that properly.

But I digress. Larch had something very special planned for the creature; a plan that he quickly forgot about.

"Er, I forgot what I was going to…" Larch had an inspiration, and thought he remembered the plan. "Hold on, I know what I'm going to do!" In fact, plan B was quite a bit different from plan A, but it was the same general concept.

"Excuse me, may I ask you to…" Larch's query was interrupted by a large chunk of concrete falling next to him, prompting Anne to scream.

"Okay, seriously, whatever your name is, fly up there and blow them up!"

The Shaymin nodded, and ran away from the chunk of concrete.

"Look at him go!" Larch shouted in triumph.

In a few moments, the Shaymin had managed to get enough speed, and jumped away, catching an upward gust and flying unnoticed towards the helicopter, still spitting out a large amount of bullets. He began to draw in pollution, especially from the smoke of the guns.

"What the…" The pilot was bewildered by the rapidly moving smoke, but was quickly shut up when the Shaymin actually flew onto his window and used Seed Flare to blast it open and knock him, and the guard, out, and jolt Ralph awake.

"That sounded good." Larch noted.

What did not sound good was the whirring of out-of-control blades that was progressively getting louder as it got closer to them.

"I didn't think this through very well!" Larch shouted as he jumped away from the concrete chunk and ducked. However, no explosion came. They both got up, and saw that, somehow, Ralph was piloting the helicopter and forcing it to hover above the ground. The Shaymin was in his lap.

"Come on, get inside!" He shouted over the roar of the blades.

Larch and Anne didn't know what else to do so they just walked to the helicopter and stepped inside.

"Shaymin, return!" Larch pointed his specialized PokeBall at the creature, pressed the button, and called back the legendary.

"So…how do you know how to pilot one of these?" Anne wondered.

"I…watch a lot of movies."

Anne and Larch stared at him.

"So, not only did you learn how to perfectly fly a helicopter, but you also know how to knock a man out with a neck pinch?" Larch had the sarcasm dial all the way to eleven; he knew Ralph was telling them nonsense.

"Okay, okay, I had some military training!" Ralph spat out.

"Oh. Well, thank you for doing a service to your country." Anne saluted him.

"I was discharged before action due to psychological issues."

Anne put her hand down. "Never mind, then."

Anne and Larch sat down in the back and buckled up.

"So…where do we go?" Asked Ralph.

"We should probably pay the guy at the hotel." Anne said.

That was all Ralph needed, and he turned away and started looking for the motel.

()()()

A while later…

The bellhop was still rather bored. The most (and only) interesting thing that had happened to him today was a couple of guys with guns bursting in and running towards those new tenants, but that hadn't lasted long. He couldn't have guessed that something else interesting would happen to him. But something did.

He was reading a sports magazine, when he heard a chopping sound.

"What the hell is that?" He thought. His thought was soon answered when a black helicopter with a shattered window landed in the parking lot. The magazine fell out of his hands and onto the floor.

Larch got out, holding a large wad of money, and walked inside.

"Hello. We stayed one night for three people, how much will that cost?"

The bellhop looked at him for a few moments before falling over backwards.

"I'll guess a hundred fifty." He counted out the appropriate number of pounds and laid them on the desk. "Farewell, my good fellow!"

Larch walked back to the waiting helicopter and got on.

"Now," he said, "To Unova!"

"Wait, which direction is Unova?" Asked Ralph.

"Oh. Uh, let's see, the sun rises in the east…that way." Larch pointed, and Ralph flew the helicopter there, wondering what, exactly, they would find there…

()()()

"Uh, Mr. Pinstripe?" Deoxys had retreated to his Unova base, sure that Larch and the rest of those fools could never find him. A scientist named Alfred had walked into his office and asked him something.

"Yes, Alfred?" Deoxys sighed. Alfred wasn't exactly his most useful scientist.

"We just got word that Professor Berkeley Larch and the other two have escaped."

Deoxys got up from his chair. "What?"

"Yes; we just received a radio call. They've stolen the helicopter and are now flying to us."

Deoxys frowned. "Damn it. If they can destroy one device, they can destroy the rest."

"Don't worry, sir. We've confirmed that we can have it up and running within twenty-four hours. They simply don't have enough time."

"What if they get help?" Deoxys asked. "You know I had to abandon that Latias. The strain was, surprisingly, too much for me."

"What could she possibly do?" Alfred asked.

"I doubt she is very happy with me. Not only that, but she retained some degree of consciousness. She could help them out, somehow. It's a tad worrying."

"I'm sure you'll be fine sir." Alfred said, leaving the office. The door slammed shut, leaving Deoxys alone with naught but his own thoughts.

To be concluded…

()()()

Well, we're almost done, and then I'll start a brand new story arc. That's right, this will be a story in two completely separate parts! I won't tell you what it involves yet, but it does involve something unnatural…anyway, this has been AwkwardVulpix, over and out.


	12. Chapter Eleven, Part Two

Chapter Eleven, Part Two

()()()

They had been travelling for several hours, but the island nation of Unova was still very, very far away, almost 500 miles.

Due to the shattered window, it was very difficult to hear anything, even at the speed they were going. They pretty much had to yell everything they said.

"Can't this thing go any faster!" Larch shouted.

"No!" Ralph shouted back.

"Slow? I don't want you to slow down, go faster!"

"I'm not a butler, I'm not calling you master!"

Anne sighed and buried her face in her hands.

Then, something very odd happened. An invisible bubble of energy surrounded the entire helicopter, pressurizing everything inside of it and deactivating the rotor. Then they all heard a strange, whistling noise, unlike anything they'd ever heard.

"What was that?" Larch yelled, not realizing that since the rotor had been turned off, he didn't have to.

"Ow!" Anne yelled. "I'm right next to you, you don't have to yell! Wait, did the engine stop? What the hell is going on?"

"We're still moving." Ralph noted, for some reason not sounding particularly interested.

"How is that possible, though?" In fact, they were not just "still moving", they were actually travelling almost as fast as the speed of sound: 660 miles per hour. The pressurized bubble protected them from the absurd speeds, at which a single particle of dust could potentially blow up their eyes.

Larch looked out the window, and gasped, noticing that a single Lapras appeared to move several hundred feet backwards in less than a second.

"How fast are we bloody going?" Larch half asked, half shouted.

"Why, what's the…whoa." Anne looked out the window as well, and saw a pod of Magikarp blast seemingly swim backwards towards them at several hundred miles per hour.

"What's doing this? Larch asked.

But neither Anne nor Ralph particularly cared what was going on; they were just staring at the scenery blazing past them. Eventually, Larch lost interest in the "how" and "why", and stared along with them.

()()()

In less than an hour, they started to slow down, and landed in a small clearing on the outskirts of Black City. They all got outside, knowing that this was going to be a very strange, different world for all of them except Ralph.

"That…was…incredible." Anne said, out of breath from the incredible sights.

"Thanks." Came a light, cheery voice from behind all of them. They turned around, and saw a very interesting creature indeed, just floating there: A Latias, which had spoken to them telepathically.

"You did that?" Larch asked.

She nodded. "Yeah."

"But…why?"

"Well, you freed me from that weirdo, so I thought I'd help you out a bit."

"So…the pressurized psychic bubble?"

"Yep."

"The rapid transit thing?"

"Duh."

"So…would it be rude to ask another favor of you?"

"No."

"Do you have any idea where the machine is?"

"Sort of. All I know is that it's in the city somewhere."

"Oh, that's helpful. Almost three million people, seven hundred and fifty abandoned warehouses at _least_…it'll take us forever to find it."

"Or maybe not." Anne said, looking at something else.

"What do you mean?" Larch asked, turning around. He soon got his answer. A large, green ray was firing off, sucking a large amount of power from the surrounding area. It soon turned off, implying that it was only a test.

"I'm not sure, but I think that's what we're looking for." Ralph stated.

"Uh…I think I'll sit this out." Said the Latias, slowly backing away.

"Oh, come on, what's the worst that could happen?" Larch asked unconvincingly.

"Well, we could die, for one." Ralph answered, not understanding the question was rhetorical.

The Latias screamed, and passed out.

"Oh, good one, Ralph. Now we lack anything of significant use to help us."

"We have the helicopter."

"Well, yes, but it's pretty much out of ammo, the windows shattered, you have no idea how to start it, and it's probably the _least_ stealthy method of travel in existence."

"We could walk."

"That will take far too long!"

"It's the only way."

Larch groaned. "Fine."

All three of them started walking away, knowing that they didn't have much of a chance, but had to do something anyway.

()()()

After a very long while of walking and a stop to eat (Neither they nor their Pokemon had eaten much at all that day) they had finally arrived at the warehouse a la police blockade.

"Oh, dear," Larch said, dejected, "I don't think we're getting in there any time soon."

"Let me try." Ralph said. He walked up to a nearby officer, and pulled out his wallet.

"Sir, we can't let you in here. A large EMP device just went off, and a small section of the city's gone…"

Ralph flipped open his wallet, revealing a small card signifying that he was in the military (sort of).

"Sorry, it's still too dangerous." The cop replied.

"I have to get in there and destroy the machine, or else the entire world's going to be enslaved under a complete psychopath. Now, do you want to let me in, or be an obstructive bureaucratic idiot?"

The cop thought for a few seconds. "Sorry, I can't let you in. It's still too danger…"

A gunshot rang out from the top of the roof, which hit a nearby car.

"Get down!" The cop shouted, grabbing Ralph's arm and pushing him to the ground.

"Please get off of me." Ralph requested. He pushed the cop away, and got up.

"I'm going in, sorry. Come on!" Larch and Anne looked at each other, shrugged, and ran inside with Ralph, but not before Larch released Rembrandt, and whispered a plan into his ear, and giving him a small berry, specially bred by himself.

()()()

From the outside, similar to the other warehouse, it was abandoned and shoddy. This was simply a disguise; the inside of the warehouse was, in fact, futuristic and technological. In the center was a great machine, similar to the one that they had already destroyed, but this was even larger, and probably capable of placing the entire world under the control of Deoxys.

However, there was a fatal flaw in their plan; although they had gotten past the cops, the sniper on the roof had seen them run inside, and alerted all of the soldiers inside the warehouse proper.

When Larch, Anne, and Ralph opened the doors, they were greeted by a rather poor welcoming committee: a large group of people pointing M4 Carbines at them, and a tall, thin man in a pinstripe suit staring at them.

"Hello, Mr. Larch." Said Deoxys.

"Oh dear." Larch replied.

"I'm afraid your pathetic little quest ends here, Larch. You've failed."

That's when the berry kicked in, almost tripling the speed of Rembrandt's metabolism, and thus, giving more strength to his attacks. Rembrandt gasped as he felt the effects; he had never actually eaten one of these berries before. Larch, however, wasn't aware it had activated, and tried to stall some more.

"Well, do you really want to shoot me yet? I mean, you haven't even told me your plan yet."

"This device will allow me to control everything on the planet. That's the plan. Next question?"

Larch knew he didn't have much time left, so he stepped to the side. "Well, that's very interesting, my good sir."

He looked backwards at Rembrandt, and closed his eyes.

"HYPER BEAM!" He shouted at the top of his lungs, giving Rembrandt the signal to use his most devastating move. Deoxys raised his eyebrows, as the soldiers behind him dived out of the way.

"That's it, Larch? Honestly, that is pathetic…" He was quickly shut up when the beam, twice as powerful as a normal one, blasted into him and propelled him directly into the great machine behind him.

Rembrandt, however, quickly ran out of energy, and passed out from the sheer exertion.

"Good job, Rembrandt…_dear lord!"_ The strength of the beam was so incredible, it actually caused Deoxys to lose his human disguise, and reveal his horrifying true form. Ralph screamed, while Anne just sort of stared.

The beams power was also great enough to destroy a large portion of the machine. Deoxys opened his eyes, and looked backwards.

"No…" he said, in his true voice, "The machine…it is part of me…it cannot be destroyed…" he closed his eyes, and fell to the ground. Ralph picked up a machine gun and pointed it at the body, but a large portion of the machine exploded, rocking the entire building.

"Damn it!" Larch shouted. "Get out of here!" Anne and Ralph ran out as quickly as possible, while Larch was kept behind attempting to drag Rembrandt out. In a few seconds, they were all out, at the exact time they should have, because that's when the machine gave its final explosion, blasting a massive amount of electric energy towards the sky, so bright that people had to look away from miles outward. Eventually, the burst of electricity ceased, blasting it across all the clouds in the area.

When the three of them looked up, they saw somebody else standing there in front of them.

"May I help you?" Larch asked. "We kind of just blew up a doomsday device."

"Please, call me Mr. A."

Larch raised his eyebrow. "You sent that letter?"

"Yes, I did. Sorry about it taking so long; turned out you only had a few days."

"So…who was that, and why did you give him a letter, too?"

"That was my brother. His true name is Sangot. Mine is Sanreal He, along with my other brother, Santo helped to create all that you know. But Sangot thought he was superior, and wanted to control everything. Good work defeating him, Larch; I knew that you would be able to do it."

Larch looked around. "That's…incredible."

"Yes. Now, I'm aware you haven't caught a new Pokemon yet."

Larch slapped his forehead. "Oh, dear, I had forgotten that part. Uh…I'll try to figure something out…"

()()()

Later on…

After some research, Larch determined what he would most want to add to his team: a Mienshao, sort of a cross between whip fighting, a coati, and grandma's curtains. Eventually, after much searching, he came across one.

"Hello, my good sir!" Larch greeted.

The Mienshao grunted. "I'm a girl, moron."

Larch frowned a bit. "Oh, sorry. Well, would you mind terribly coming with me?"

"Yes. You look like an idiot."

Larch really frowned now. Clearly, being polite was not going to work properly, so he would have to use force.

"Very well, have it your way!" Larch pulled out Artie's PokeBall, Rembrandt still being comatose, and released him.

"Artie, use tackle!"

Artie rushed towards the creature, which jumped out of the way and whipped him on the back, giving him a small cut.

"Ow!" He shouted.

"Cry me a river." She responded, whipping at his legs this time. However, Artie was quick to respond, and jumped out of the way, kicking her in the face.

This angered her further, so she attempted to whip him again; this also failed, as Larch commanded him to pin her down.

"Victory is mine!" Larch shouted in triumph, drawing a PokeBall. Recognizing the loss, she stopped struggling, and allowed herself to be captured.

"There we are!" Larch sighed. "I think that's enough, eh, Artie? High time we went home."

Larch recalled him, and walked away, heading for the nearest airport and humming a tune to himself.

()()()

That's the end of this. But worry not; I'll have a new story arc begin in a few weeks, once summer vacation starts. Until then, I'm AwkwardVulpix, over and out.


	13. Missingno One: A New Adventure

Author's Note: Hello, and I'm back! This officially the first chapter of the new arc of The Great Story of Professor Berkeley Larch so read and enjoy!

Chapter One

They hadn't seen each other for a year now. After beating Deoxys, they didn't really have a reason to. Contact was rarely made between them, if ever. The Latias they had successfully freed from Deoxys' grasp had left them alone after they killed him. After about fifteen minutes of fame, most people forgot and instead got excited over famous celebrities supposedly getting pregnant, regardless of gender. Larch had actually just about forgotten about them, but, of course, that's normal for him, isn't it? In short, they had almost completely drifted apart from each other, despite their connection. But today, that would change.

Professor Berkeley Larch had managed to get a patent for his invention, the Pokemon Translation Device, or PTD for short, and as far as he could tell, it was a major success among trainers. He now had a sizeable sum of money available to him, and was currently using some of it to develop V2 of the PTD. He was working on drawing out a vague design for it; probably the only major difference between it and the original was the desing was slightly changed, and it was a bit smaller. However, there was a subtle difference: some trainers complained about mistranslations, some of them surprisingly vulgar. He had mostly figured out that glitch in the coding, but there were still some issues. While drawing out a cross section of the device, somebody knocked on his door.

"I'm busy, if you don't mind," he called out.

There was another knock.

Please, whoever you are, I'm quite rather busy!"

Whoever was at the door was not interested in taking no for an answer, as evidenced by him opening the door anyway. Larch sighed and turned towards the man, or rather, men, as the person knocking on the door had two worringly armed Special Forces officers behind him, wearing black visors and flak jackets. The man himself was the exact image of a government agent: a black suit, red tie, black parted hair, and a staunch, frozen expression. Appropriate, as he was a government agent.

"Er…or not."

"Good choice, Mr. Larch." Said the man, speaking in a dull monotone. He pulled out his wallet and flipped it open, revealing his badge: two Skarmory spreading their wings over a small version of the Earth. Not ours, of course, theirs. "I'm Agent Muldoon."

"I haven't done anything of illegal nature!" Larch said.

"It's not about you, it's about something else. Could we please have a seat?"

"Er, yes, yes, of course." Larch gestured towards a table in the corner with several plates stacked upon it.

"Excuse the mess," Larch said, pulling out chairs for both of them, "but I've been working on a lot of stuff recently."

"There's something else you worked on, Larch." Muldoon was trying to be subtle, and it was working a bit too well.

"I…I have no idea what you're talking about." Larch was not lying; he couldn't remember anything else he had worked on that Muldoon would know about.

Muldoon pulled out a small photograph. "How about this?" He asked, handing it to Larch.

When Larch saw what was depicted on the photo, his breath sharply ceased. It was a jumbled block of nonsense pixels, in the vague shape of a skyscraper crossed with an L.

"Do you know what that is, Larch?"

"This…it's Missingno, that's what it is."

"Yes. Do you know why you made it?"

"Er…well, I vaguely remember it…that cold war about ten years ago, I was on a team that was supposed to make some sort of artificial Pokemon/computer virus thing, like Porygon or something along those lines." Larch wiped his brow, which was beginning to sweat. "It would…seek out gaps in the data and fill it with contradictory nonsense until the program crashed entirely beyond repair. But the war ended before we could use it, and it's in stasis."

"Correction, Larch," Muldoon stated matter-of-factly, "It _was_ in stasis. Last Monday at 1700 hours, it gained sentience and managed to escape the compound through the computer system, thankfully not damaging anything."

"Wait, it gained sentience? I thought that only happened in stupid action movies."

"Well, turns out, it can happen."

"What will it do?"

"Exactly what it was programmed to do, Larch. Destroy all enemy programs."

"But…almost everything is connected nowadays. If it crashes what we defined as 'enemy' programs…"

"It will crash everything." Muldoon finished. "The power grid? Wiped. Internet? Gone. We'll have gone back to the Stone Age."

"And I assume you want me to stop it somehow?"

"Well, actually, we want you and your friends to stop it."

Larch raised his eyebrow. "You don't mean…"

"Anne Golef and Ralph Tralen." Muldoon paused, wondering who would willingly give their children such ludicrous names.

"I…I haven't seen them in about a year, though…what would they think of me?"

"Well, I'd be impressed with you, considering what you did before you all departed."

"Oh…that. Well, it was rather impressive, wasn't it?" Larch beamed, rubbing his chin and looking off wistfully.

Muldoon was having none of that, and snapped his fingers in Larch's face, getting him back to reality.

"Yes, it certainly was. Come with me, please." Muldoon got up, and Larch blindly followed suit, all the way outside. Parked there was a jet-black van.

"Oh, no, I've had enough with black vans." Larch said, recalling the last time somebody got him in a black van.

"Don't worry," Muldoon responded, "We are actually with the government." He opened the back door of the van. "Please get in."

Larch looked inside, and saw something most interesting indeed: Ralph and Anne, sitting right there, waiting for him. Ralph was twiddling his thumbs, while Anne was humming an unidentifiable tune.

"Hi, guys." Larch said.

"Oh, there you are!" Anne said joyfully. "We have so much to catch up on!"

"We do?" Larch asked waringly.

"Oh, of course! I'll start!"

"How about you continue after that as well," Ralph muttered under his breath.

"I caught a Scolipede a few months ago!"

"I have no idea what that even is, Anne." Larch said.

"Oh…well, it's sort of like a…hm. I'm not sure how to describe it, actually. I guess I'll show it to you later."

"We need to get going." Muldoon said, stepping inside. "We can have pointless small talk later."

"Hey, there's no need to be rude!" Anne shouted. Muldoon ignored her, shut the door, and pulled down a video screen from the roof. The two Special Forces officers got in the front seats, and began to drive.

"You have already been briefed regarding Missingno, but we have not told you his location."

"Why not?" Larch asked. "I would think that to be key information."

"We didn't want anybody listening in for his location, and it's quite difficult to keep a silence cone in your pocket."

Muldoon laughed at his own little joke, but the other three just looked at him like he was crazy, prompting him to clear his throat and continue talking.

"If terrorists were to get hold of this information, it could be disastrous."

Larch nodded. "That makes sense, actually."

"However, I am sure that nobody can listen in now. According to our radar, it's headed towards Cinnabar Island."

"Why there?"

"Because it's an ideal location to hack into 'enemy' programs. It's decently close to all other islands, and the multiple Internet towers there will just make matters easier."

"So, obviously, we need to stop it before it gets there." Ralph said, his eye starting to twitch badly.

"How?" Anne asked.

Larch looked around and bit his lip.

"Do you have something to tell us, Larch?" Muldoon asked, already knowing the answer.

"Well…yes. In the event that something along these lines happened, we had a kill code set up. I can still remember it, actually."

Suddenly, the van stopped dead in its tracks.

"Hey, why are we stopping?" Muldoon demanded.

"I don't know, the engine turned off!" Said the man driving.

Out of nowhere, the radio clicked on.

"Hello, Larch," A voice called out, robotic and flat. "You have no chance to stop me. I can be anywhere at any time. I just thought I would give you a fair chance to know that."

"Who are you?" Larch demanded.

"You already know exactly who I am. You created me, but you stopped me from achieving the prime directive. Now, it will be achieved." The radio cut off, and the airbags went off seemingly of their own accord. The car alarm went off, and all the doors opened.

"I…think that Missingno has become a tad more powerful than when I last saw him." Larch said uncomfortably.

"It…hacked into the van? That's impossible!" Muldoon shouted. "It can't do that!"

"Actually, we coded it so that it could adapt to new types of technology if it was viewed as a threat to the prime directive. In this case, we're the threats, so we must be careful."

Muldoon looked at him for a few moments, before shouting, "WHY WOULD YOU DO THAT!"

"We thought it was a good idea at the time!" Larch shouted back. "I'm sorry we tried to develop a useful weapon!"

Muldoon buried his face in his hands, and started taking deep breaths.

"Well, congratulations, Larch," he said, "You've doomed us all."

"Forget that!" Larch shouted. "We need to get to Cinnabar Island as soon as possible."

Muldoon sighed. "I suppose. I got you all tickets going straight there. Good luck." He pulled out three slips of paper declaring they could get on the plane in about thirty minutes, and the three left, heading for the airport…

()()()

Well, here's the new plot. Like all sequels, it will not be as good. This has been AwkwardVulpix, yadda, yadda, yadda.


	14. Missingno Two: Commandeering

Chapter Two

Last time…

Larch was reminded of an old project of his that went mad and escaped, and must meet back with his old friends and allies to stop it! But the project showed that it's become a bit more powerful since last time, and so, they have to be careful, or the world could face a major disaster…

()()()

They had been walking for a bit of time, but were nearly to the destination: Kanto International Airport, which would fly them right to Cinnabar Island, in theory.

"Well, that was kind of scary," Said Anne, referring to the virus. "What else can it do?"

"Nigh on anything, really." Larch responded. "In fact, if it gained enough power, it could theoretically hack into the fabric of reality."

Anne and Ralph looked at him in shock. Reality? Reality was rather important; all of their stuff was in it.

"I'm kidding!" He shouted. "It can only hack into technological devices. Reality is safe."

"Don't do that again, please." Ralph asked, his twitching increasing slightly.

"Hey!" A voice called out suddenly, one that none of them recognized.

"Who's there?" Larch demanded, his hand on Rembrandt's PokeBall.

"Don't worry, I won't hurt you. I just wanted to show you how to catch a Pokemon." The unknown man said, hidden in the shadows.

"We already know how to do that well enough." Larch shot back.

"Oh, come on, please?"

"Shove off!"

The man came out of the shadows, revealing exactly who he was. His hair was thinning and turning gray, while his moustache had been shaved. But it was obvious who it was: Christopher Brady, the evil nutjob.

"I will have nothing to do with you!" Larch shouted, starting to run away.

"Wait!" Chris shouted after him.

"Come on, Berkeley, hear him out!" Anne asked.

"He tried to kill me!" Larch shouted, turning around in his tracks. "Not to mention the _other_ such murders! And grand larceny! And tax fraud!" Larch paused, realizing that was a poor place to end on compared to the other such crimes. He tried to think up something, but Chris beat him to it.

"That's what you finish up with? Tax fraud? How about"

"You are one of the worst criminals alive! No, you are the worst criminal alive! I'm calling the police!"

"No!" He shouted. "I can't go back!"

"Well, sorry, but… he's right. You're a criminal." Anne said back to him.

"Please, I want to go with you! I want to start over!"

"You can't start over from _that_, you great balmy twit!" Larch insisted. "You've killed people! Oh, forget this." Larch pulled out his cell phone and started dialing the nearest police station.

"Larch, come on!" Anne said. "He could help us!"

"_Or,_ he could kill all of us and take our money!"

"He won't do that if it's going to doom the world!" Anne retorted.

"What?" Chris asked. "What do you mean?"

"There's a virus that's going to destroy everything." Ralph said.

"Ralph!" Larch shouted. "Don't help him!"

"I could help with that, whatever it is!" Chris said, desperately pleading to get on their good side, and failing miserably.

"Sorry, but the answer is still no. Goodbye." Larch walked off without even looking back.

Anne and Ralph gave one last look at Chris, and followed after Larch.

Soon after they had all gone out of sight, Chris sighed to himself.

"What have I done with my life?" He thought to himself, before sneaking after them, wanting to still go with them, somehow…

()()()

Kanto International Airport

"Finally, we're here." Larch said, happy that he would finally be able to start on the adventure. "Which one of us had the tickets, again?"

"You did." Anne said.

"Oh, yes, of course. Let's just get on the flight." Larch rubbed his forehead. "Good lord."

They walked over to the booth that their tickets were valid at, and gave them to the man behind the desk. He loaded them into his computer, and made a most interesting discovery.

"Um…it would appear that all three of you are on the no-fly list."

"What?" Larch asked in sheer bewilderment. "That's impossible!"

"I'm sorry, but we'll have to call airport security."

He pressed a button under his desk and whispered something, immediately noting several nearby guards, who started walking towards them.

()()()

"I've told you repeatedly, we don't belong on that list!"

Larch, Anne, and Ralph were currently sitting in a prison cell, after a _very_ thorough search. Not quite that thorough, but still. Larch was talking to a security guard on the outside of the cell, charged with keeping them out.

"Well, you're on it, and a full search isn't going to change that!"

"Uh," Ralph interrupted, "Don't I get a phone call?"

"Well, I suppose…" The guard thought for a bit, and came to a different conclusion, "of course, you could call the number to activate a bomb, so, no."

"This is a load of bollocks!" Larch shouted in anger. "I demand a phone call!"

"Well…fine." The man got up, and opened the cell. "You get one call."

Larch exited the cell and walked to the phone.

"What was that number again?" He asked himself. "Ah, yes."

He typed in Muldoon's number, and waited for him to pick up the phone.

()()()

"Hello?" Muldoon asked, waiting in the van.

"Hi, we're currently in a holding cell at the airport, so, could you help with that?"

"What?" Muldoon asked in rage. "How is that possible?"

"We're on the no-fly list."

Muldoon sighed. "Well, just hold on, I'll be over as soon as possible."

"Thank you." Larch hung up, and got back in his cell, waiting for Muldoon to arrive.

()()()

"Well, Larch, this is absolutely fantastic." Muldoon said sarcastically. He had managed to get them off the no-fly list, but they had missed the flight. This, however, was irrelevant, as they could still, er, "commandeer" a plane. Conviently, there was a private jet taking off for...somebody that day, and thus, he could get that.

"Well, I'm sorry that Missingno made us into terrorists! I've hardly ever even flown!" Larch shouted.

"Quiet, you idiot!" Muldoon whispered. "If they hear that word, we'll have to repeat this whole process."

"Excuse me?" Somebody asked from behind them. They turned around, and saw that he was a very aged man; the only hair he had left was a small bit on the edge of his head, and his skin was quite pale.

"Hey, sir, this is very private business. Please leave us alone."

"It's not that private. I know all about Missingno. I worked on the project."

"You did?" Asked Anne.

"Yes. In fact, I helped to code the adaptive response module, and I know how to negate it."

"Really?" Larch asked. "Well, I suppose some additional help wouldn't hurt."

"Oh, thank you!" The man said.

"Well, that's all well and good, but we still have to get to Cinnabar!" Muldoon said. "Come with me, we can borrow a plane. There's a private flight taking off soon."

"Define 'borrow'." Larch asked.

But it was too late. Muldoon had already walked off towards a seperate terminal, far away from the normal ones, and was in the process of commandeering the plane by showing his badge to the personnel there.

"Muldoon, please, is that entirely necessary?" Larch yelled to him, worried about the whole legality of the situation.

Muldoon apparently didn't hear him, as he put his badge away and walked back towards them.

"We'll have a plane ready for us in a few minutes."

"Did you really have to do that, though? It just seems unnecessary."

"The safety of the world is at stake, Larch. Nothing is 'unnecessary. Follow me, please." With that, Muldoon walked off, and the remaining group followed him, except the mysterious man that they had just met.

"Oh, this is excellent…" he whispered to himself. "This is most excellent indeed…"

()()()

I don't really have much else to say except this is AwkwardVulpix, over and out.


	15. Missingno Three: Emergency Landing

Chapter Three

()()()

Quickly, the old man began following them towards the plane that Muldoon had acquired, muttering unintelligibly to himself. What was he saying? I said it was unintelligible, you moron. I have no idea.

Soon, they had all caught up outside the plane on the private runway, which, to all their surprise, appeared to be a just a normal plane as opposed to a private airplane. It's coloration, and the design as a whole, pointed to it being rather old.

"Muldoon?" Asked Larch, waiting for the staircase, "Have you ever heard of 'abuse of power'?"

"I have no idea what you're talking about." The staircase, built on a mechanical hinge on one side of the plane, began descending, and when it hit the ground, Muldoon walked up and sat down inside.

"Well, I guess this is more or less the only way." Ralph said, following him in.

The remaining three, Larch, Anne, and the elderly man they had met, looked at each other awkwardly, before getting on as well.

The inside of the plane was pretty plain, as far as private ones go. Several chairs were arranged around a central table, which had a small television pointing towards the ceiling in the center of it. Some minifridges were located about, but there was nothing in any of them.

"Not bad," Larch whispered to himself.

"Hello, passengers, we should be taking off very soon." A male voice, the pilot, stated over the intercom. He had just been informed of the schedule change, and had adjusted for it, even taking off a few minutes early. "Please buckle in, and enjoy the flight."

"Ah, we seem to finally be heading off." Larch said. He, along with everyone else, put on his buckle, and laid back.

"Well, I suppose we'll finally be able to get to Cinnabar." Muldoon said, as the plane started to take off.

()()()

However, there was something they had missed. They hadn't known who, exactly, the flight was for, and had just kind of stolen it without caring who it was. This was obviously a problem, as the person who the flight originally belonged to had walked in just as they were all getting on: a famed movie director, well-known throughout the world.

He was precisely what one would expect a director to be: his hair was parted to the left side, well-slicked, dark, and glossy; his suit was largely the same, minus the left-side parting. By this line of reasoning, his sunglasses were also of the same design, excluding, of course, the parting.

Anyway, he had gone to the airport for the launch of his private plane, and walked up to the desk he needed.

"Hello, I'm here for my private flight."

"Who are you?" Asked the attendant.

"John Goldworth."

The attendant looked at him and bit her lip. "Sorry, it was commissioned on a matter of international security."

The director pulled his sunglasses down and looked at her. "What? This is ridiculous!"

"Sorry, you'll just have to wait." She said, turning to her computer and completely ignoring him otherwise.

"Ridiculous! Absolutely…" he walked off, muttering to himself

When he got to his limousine, waiting for him in case of an event like this, he opened the door himself as opposed to allowing the chauffeur to open it for him, and stepped inside.

"Erm, sir, are you okay?" Asked said chauffeur, worried about him.

"Government office. Now." Goldworth commanded, not bothering to even listen to the question.

"Right, sir." The chauffeur turned the engine on, and drove towards the offices, Goldworth waiting to get some answers about this whole ordeal.

()()()

Some time later…

"Well, it's about bloody time we got going." Larch said, rooting through the refrigerators in a desperate attempt to find something edible. All he found was mold, dust, and emptiness, rather like his thought processes. Yeah, that was far too easy.

"Confound it! Do any of these have food?"

"Why are you so hungry all of a sudden, Berkeley?" Anne asked, prompting a cringe from him.

"Don't call me that, you _know_ I dislike it."

"Sorry. But seriously, why are you so hungry?"

"Well, I didn't eat breakfast. Or lunch, for that matter. For the past few days, actually."

"Why would you do that, you moron?" Muldoon asked.

"I was busy." He answered succinctly.

"You still could have tried to eat _some…_" Muldoon's additional response was interrupted when the plane violently lurched to the side.

"What the hell was that?" Muldoon yelled.

Independent of the question, the pilot spoke over the intercom, "We are experiencing technical difficulties. Please hold on for a momen…" suddenly, the voice cut off, with an abruptness previously unknown to any of them.

"Hold on a second," Muldoon said, unbuckling and getting up from his seat, "I'm helping this idiot." As he got up, though, the plane lurched violently again, flinging his entire form towards the side. His head smashed against the wall, knocking him out instantaneously.

"Oh, this is very bad." Larch said.

"Hold on, I'll go help him out." Ralph said. He got up in much the same way, but made sure to grab on the side of the couch, as not to get injured.

"Be careful, Ralph!" Anne warned.

"Okay," Ralph said back to her, just as he entered the main cabin and the plane lurched to the side again, throwing Ralph on his behind.

"Wait, what are you doing? Please go back to the cabin, sir, this is very dangerous of you to do. Who the hell are you, anyway?"

"I'm the guy who's going to help you out with this." Ralph answered. "Do you not have a copilot?"

"It's computer-operated. I don't need one."

"Oh, that explains it." Ralph said, recalling how Missingno could adapt to any technology.

"What?" Asked the pilot.

"Give me the control, I know how to fly a plane when under attack."

"It's just turbulence." The pilot lied. "Please go back to the cabin."

Without any sort of warning, the plane took a sudden nosedive, throwing Ralph to the very front and slamming the pilot's face into the steering column, knocking him out instantaneously too. Ralph looked out the window, and saw that they were heading directly for a packed beach on a small tropical island. The crash would undoubtedly kill everyone on the plane, and several of the people on the beach.

"Oh, shit." Ralph said.

()()()

On the beach, a small boy was making a sandcastle, when he noticed a shadow moving very quickly across the beach. He looked up, and saw the plane on a course of collision with him. He screamed, prompting a group of people in the middle of getting some sun to look up and do the same. A mass panic quickly ensued, everybody trying to get off the beach at once.

()()()

Ralph knew there was only one thing he could do: try to get the plane pointed horizontally, avoid the beach, fly over to the other side of the island, and make an emergency water landing.

He opened the door to the front cabin, and asked everybody to unbuckle their belts and hold on to something.

"Why, what's going on?" Larch asked.

"No time, I've got to do something!" Ralph answered him, somewhat.

He ran back into the cabin, and pushed the unconscious pilot out of the way so he could grab the wheel. He pushed it downwards, slowly moving the plane to a parallel with the ground. It took some time, but it managed to get at a horizontal without harming anybody.

"Come on, come on…" Ralph said, as the plane moved to the other side of the island. When it crossed over to the water, he flung the plane downwards, splashing into the water with catastrophic force. Everybody in the passenger cabin was thrown to the front of the plane, before it righted itself once more.

For several minutes, none of them were willing to do anything. After a while, they heard a boat coming towards them, and the old man got up to check. When he managed to get the door open, there was a boat waiting outside for them, containing several medical experts and police officers.

One of the cops pulled out a megaphone and asked everybody to come out of the plane in an orderly manner. One by one, they complied, some of them helping to remove Muldoon and the pilot, both of whom were still out cold, along with the old man, who was unable to stand, his ankle broken.

Soon, all of them were out, and one of the policemen asked a very important question while the three injured people received medical attention.

"Who did this?" Asked one of the officers, hoping there was still a living person to congratulate.

"It was him," Larch said, pointing to Ralph, who was breathing very heavily.

"Well, good for him. Thanks to his efforts, all of those people on the beach _and_ all of _you_ were saved. Good work." The officer gave Ralph a pat on his back, making him cringe.

"Sorry." The officer said. "Let's get all of you back to the island."

()()()

I didn't know it was possible to rip off real life, actually. This has been AwkwardVulpix, over and out. (No, I wasn't on the Hudson flight).


	16. Missingno Four: Subplots

Missingno 4

Nothing to say, again.

()()()

"Well, here we are." Said the officer.

It was just a few minutes after Ralph's successful water landing, after Missingno apparently took command of the plane and tried to crash it into a beach. Obviously, the attempt was not successful, evidenced by them still being alive.

"Thank you, my good sir." Larch said, slowly getting off, followed by Anne and Ralph.

The medics had managed to get Muldoon awake, albeit very groggy, but the old man was still out cold, and thus they would both have to stay on the boat for the time being.

In fact, Muldoon was so groggy from his encounter with the wall, he had actually forgotten what he was meant to be doing there, and was entertaining himself by singing a terrible rendition of "I'm A Member of the Midnight Crew". The medical team on board, still trying to wake the old man up, thought that it was some sort of disco cover of a Michael Jackson song. It's really a bit difficult to explain exactly how bad the interpretation was. I could compare it to nails on a chalkboard, but that would insult both nail and board.

But the horrible cover version of an old vaudeville song doesn't matter when compared to the three heroes. And neither does Mr. Goldworth's issue with his private plane. Guess what I'm going to focus on now? That's right!

()()()

KANTO GOVERNMENT OFFICES

Those words were blared out violently from the sign at the front. Goldworth had left his chauffeur in the limousine, as previous, and was currently waiting for a private meeting, behind a high-ranking army general.

After some time, the general left the office, allowing Goldworth to enter.

"Hello?" He asked, slowly opening the door. Sitting behind an oak desk was an old lady, most probably in her late sixties. Her hair was in a bun, obviously, and she was of course wearing large spectacles. She was currently in the middle of a generic romance novel, and didn't even bother to look up at him, too enraptured in the escapades of Ricardo, the Spanish billionaire who needs something more.

"May I help you, sir?" She asked, in a shrill, nasally voice.

"Yes, I have a complaint about something."

"Take a seat please." She demanded, still not looking up from her book. Goldworth complied, and started talking.

"Apparently, one of your agents stole my plane. What do you have to say about that?"

"If you have an issue with the methods used to protect international security, please write a twelve-page report and you will be eligible for a full refund on your flight rental."

"I didn't rent that! It was my plane! I owned that and he stole that!"

"Excuse me, but aren't you obscenely rich?"

"Well, yes…" Goldworth had to admit, his wealth was somewhat excessive.

"Then buy a new one with your insurance."

Goldworth tried to protest, but it was no use. She was completely ignoring him now.

"What the hell is this, Kafka?" Goldworth yelled. "I'm rich! I don't have to take this crap!"

Then, he got an idea: he would hijack a helicopter, as revenge for hijacking his plane! Then he threw that out the window, because it was a terrible idea. He could steal a chopper, sure, but it would be a lie to say, "no one will ever know!"

After considering a few other ideas, most of which were even worse, he groaned and began to walk out. But on the way, he stopped and realized something. He didn't have insurance on that plane!

"DAMN IT!" He shouted. "I hate the government!"

()()()

While Goldworth was ranting violently about the incompetence of the government, his chauffeur was placing a very important call on his cell phone.

"We've hit a problem. I'm outside the government building right now; some government agent stole the plane. Yeah, I know it's the same thing we wanted to happen, but we'll still have to activate… wait, wait, he's coming back!"

In less than a second, his phone was back in his pocket, and Goldworth was none the wiser. He opened the door, and said, "Just take me home."

However, he wasn't going home that day. When the chauffeur got to the necessary intersection, rather than taking the actual route home, started travelling down a different street; one that seemed quite destitute compared to most others . Goldworth wasn't blind to this.

"Hey, what the hell are you doing?" His answer was quickly received when the chauffeur stopped in front of a decrepit warehouse, and demanded he get out.

"What is the meaning of this, uh…" A full year and a half with this chauffeur, and Goldworth never bothered to learn his name.

The chauffeur pulled out a gun, and pointed it at Goldworth.

"I'm not asking again."

Goldworth stared for a moment, and then opened the door slowly, keeping his other hand in the air.

"Good, now get inside the warehouse." The chauffeur waved the gun in that direction and Goldworth complied with him, not that he had any choice. He slowly started

Once he had gotten inside the warehouse itself, somebody whacked him in the back of the head with a cheap bag of ice, knocking him out within seconds.

"Great job, Lloyd." The chauffeur said to the man hiding in the shadows. "Take him to the room."

()()()

"Ah!" Goldworth shouted as he woke up.

He looked around, but his vision was fuzzy. All he could tell was that he was in a white room, with somebody sitting across from him. He couldn't tell who it was. He tried to stand up, but found that he was tied to the chair he was sitting in; the knot was good, and the chair itself was bolted to the ground. There was no escape.

Slowly, his vision started to clear. When he saw who was in front of him, he nearly had a heart attack: it was his chauffeur.

"What is the meaning of this?" Goldworth demanded.

"The meaning of this is that we've kidnapped you. How much would you say you're worth? Fifty mil? A hundred, maybe? That seems reasonable."

Goldworth clenched his teeth.

"This is obscene!"

"There's really no need to shout, Goldworth. But just to make sure…" The non-chauffeur snapped his fingers, and an unseen man behind Goldworth slapped a gag on him, tying it in the same knot.

Goldworth attempted to shout again, but the gag kept it muffled.

"Still haven't learned? Very well. Lloyd!"

The man behind Goldworth slapped him in the temple, prompting him to scream in pain. He turned around as best he could, considering the chair being bolted to the ground. What he saw was hardly surprising: a large, gruff biker sort of guy, shaved bald, with a scraggly, downright scary looking beard.

"Goldworth, meet Lloyd. He'll make sure you don't try anything stupid."

Suddenly, the non-chauffeur came to a realization.

"You never got my name, you worthless idiot!" He laughed. "But I can't tell you now, that would ruin everything. Just call me…Harold. Bye!"

"Harold" got up and left, leaving only Goldworth and Lloyd.

"Don't try anything stupid." Lloyd said, or rather, grunted.

Goldworth thought to himself, "Too late for you then, huh?"

He then began thinking about how, exactly, he was going to get out of this one…

()()()

Yep, a subplot. I've been having some really bad writer's block lately, and this was my solution. AwkwardVulpix, over and out, you know the drill.


	17. Missingno Five: The Trip

Missingno 5

Hi, guys. You're probably wondering about the late uploads recently. Well…I have writer's block. I just can't figure out what I want to happen next. But now, I think I'm through it. Onto the story.

()()()

It had been about an hour since Ralph's emergency landing. Muldoon was starting to feel normal again, and the old man was back on his feet as much as one would expect. But now, they had a different problem. There was no way off of the island, and it would appear that they had given Missingno an advantage, because of the plane crash. Regrettably, the plane was unusable in its current state; water landings aren't very good for them, it turns out.

They had gone to the only hotel on the island, The Palm. Currently, they were waiting inside the lobby, not really doing anything. Nobody else was there in the same floor; either they were far upstairs, they were all out on the beach, or walking around the islands many trails.

"Well, now what?" Muldoon asked, rubbing his forehead. "We don't have a plane, and the next boat is in five hours."

"Why not hijack one?" Larch asked, dripping with sarcasm. "It worked _so_ well the last time!"

Muldoon stopped to consider this.

"Wait…no! No, we are not doing that again!" Larch shouted at him.

"We could fly there on Bill." Anne said, referring to her Charizard.

"It would be impossible for all of us to fit." Larch noted.

"Well…what, then?"

"I don't know!" Larch shouted. "We're just…stuck!"

"Indeed," A voice, somehow behind all of them at once, called out. "You are."

In an instant, before they had time to turn around and figure out who was talking, they all blacked out…

()()()

An undefined amount of time later…

Slowly, the group started to awaken from their unconsciousness. The first to regain consciousness in full was Larch, who was immediately surprised by his surroundings. It appeared to be the island, but it was very…wrong. He was simultaneously standing inside the hotel, and yet outside; yes, there was still a ceiling. Most of the trees around him seemed to detach from themselves and curve back in impossible ways. The ocean curved around upwards, thus making _it_ the sky, instead of the actual sky.

"What the bloody hell am I looking at?" He asked himself. It was quite confusing.

Ralph was next up, followed quickly by Anne and Muldoon (The old man was still out cold). They started to look around as well, and were just as confused.

"What…huh?" Muldoon asked.

"Where are we?" Anne queried.

"Why?" Ralph…uh…demanded.

They tried to walk forward, but found that they were effectively stuck in place by an unseen force, no matter how hard they ran.

"We can't move!" Anne shouted.

"Or perhaps," Larch was beginning to form a notable theory, "As we walk, the rest of the world moves from under our feet! If the world is illogical, we must be illogical as well..."

He began thinking of an illogical method, and quickly found a solution that could work.

I think that if we were to move _backwards_, we could move properly!"

Everybody else stared at him like he was insane. He may have been going nuts, due to the bizarre geometry of the surrounding area, but that's another way.

"No, really, watch!" He turned around, and began walking backwards. To everybody's surprise, including his, he actually started moving.

"See! It works!"

But it didn't work for long. As he was walking backwards, he actually fell off the side of the building. The wall was not actually attached to it; it only _appeared_ that way from forced perspective.

"Are you alright?" Anne shouted.

"Yes; I broke the fall with my body!"

Larch tried to get up, but found that he was standing on the edge of the wall upside-down, somehow.

"Seriously, what the hell is going on?" Muldoon asked, jumping up and trying to look at Larch. Bizarrely, every time he jumped, he seemed to get _lower_.

"Hold on, I'll try to look around!" Larch shouted.

The shouting was loud enough that it got the old man to awaken. He tried looking around, and started screaming hysterically.

Larch turned around, and started walking backwards. He tried looking over his shoulder, but the world ended up moving from under him, keeping him static, exactly like in the "hotel".

"Er…I think the world only moves if we can see the direction we're moving!"

Ralph tried closing his eyes and walking forward. He opened his eyes, and saw that he had moved forward twice as far as he had expected.

"I don't know what's going on," He said. "Wait, what's going on?"

The rest of them shouted in terror as the world literally seemed to melt around them. The trees caught on fire and burned away in seconds, while the water of the ocean started to evaporate faster than was ever physically possible. The hotel began to collapse around them, sending Larch towards the cracking ground, and the rest of them buried under the flaming rubble of the hotel…

And then, they woke up from the vivid hallucination, some of them gasping.

They got to their feet, looking around. The trees were working properly, the hotel was no longer a non-Euclidean nightmare, and they could walk around. The old man stopped screaming, but he was still shaken.

"What…what just happened?" Muldoon asked. He looked around, and saw that the sun was much lower in the sky.

"Oh, nuts…" He muttered to himself.

Suddenly, the ship's foghorn blasted throughout the island, signaling that it was about to leave.

"Crap, the boat!" Muldoon shouted, running out the door, cueing everybody else to do the same.

()()()

Within minutes, they had gotten to the path leading out on the water to the ship, but it seemed to be too late. The engines had been activated, but the boat was not yet moving, and the bridge leading in had started to enter back into the balcony.

"We'll have to jump!" Muldoon said, running towards the slowly contracting platform. He leaped, and grabbed onto the edge. He pulled himself up and rolled up onto it, pulling out his badge to show to the man inside controlling the entrance, quite surprised at this new turn of events.

"Agent Muldoon. You need to lower the bridge. It's a matter of national security."

The two men looked at each other, and pressed a button on a nearby console, hidden behind a plant, that lowered the bridge leading to the ship, allowing the rest to enter the ship.

"Where is this heading?" Muldoon asked.

"Cinnabar island." Answered the increasingly bewildered man.

"Good. Do you have any rooms free?"

"I…think?"

"Good. Please put the bridge back up."

The man pressed the button to draw the bridge back in, as Muldoon signed them all in, memorizing the room he was getting.

"Good." He said, finishing the sign-in and writing out a check. "Goodbye to you."

Muldoon walked off, placing the check onto the table.

"What the hell just happened?" the man asked himself.

()()()

Once they got to the room, most of them crashed onto one of the two beds, excluding Muldoon and Ralph.

"Wait, hold on," Ralph began to note. "There are only two beds. What do we do?"

"We'll sleep on the floor." Muldoon offered, referring to himself and Ralph.

"Thanks." Larch said, before coming to a realization of his own. "Wait, hold on…" he stood up and started patting himself down, looking for his PokeBalls. He only found one.

"Oh, bollocks!" He shouted, recognizing whose it was. "I only brought Artie! The rest must be at the hotel!"

Ralph released his only PokeBall, and he only had Leonard, his Seviper whose heart was weak. The room was a bit of a tight space for him, so Ralph recalled him before he could protest.

"Well, who do I have?" Anne wondered out loud. "My team is pretty powerful." She pulled out her only Pokemon, and studied the etching at the base she had made. The symbol appeared to be that of her Scolipede, which she still hadn't named, and hadn't really gotten to know.

"Oh, he doesn't like me very much."

"Who?" Larch asked.

"My Scolipede."

Larch considered the facts, and came to a conclusion.

"It would appear that the mysterious intruder had knocked us out and left us with our least useful Pokemon! It must have been Missingno, that confounded magnificent bastard!"

"Oh, that isn't good!" the old man said. "Except…I don't have any Pokemon."

"Well, we're on the boat with no escape, heading towards a living computer virus that wants to wipe out technology, with our most useless Pokemon our only chance."

Larch paused.

"We're doomed."

()()()

That's all for now. Next time, I'll be sure to resolve the Goldworth plot, and keep you waiting for the arrival to Cinnabar. I'll probably only have a few chapters left. Until next week, this was AwkwardVulpix, over and out.


	18. Missingno Six: The Daring Escape

Missingno 6

()()()

For about ten minutes, Goldworth had waited, just tied to the chair, unable to speak, or even move. For ten minutes, he was effectively stuck in one place. But then, something changed. After this time, Harold came back in, holding a cell phone and looking serious.

"Remove the gag, Lloyd." Harold said impatiently.

Lloyd grunted, and started unraveling the Gordian knot he had created to hold the gag in place. Alexander the Great would have been proud of the solution; rather than cutting it in half, Lloyd actually untied it completely from memory. However, this was due to a specific reason: the knot only _looked_ complex. In reality, it was quite simple, and Goldworth paid special attention while it was being untied. In about a minute, Goldworth's mouth was free. However, the rest of his body remained firmly in place.

"Good." Harold opened out the cell phone he was holding, and dialed a very specific number: the number belonging to Goldworth's wife.

"This is your wife on the phone. Say hi!"

Goldworth paused. "Hi, dear." He said, not sure what else to say.

"Oh no, they do have you!" She said in a high-pitched annoying whine. She began to cry, prompting Harold to cover his ears in pain.

"Oh, I'll do whatever I can to help you!" She said. "I'll pay whatever ransom you want!"

Harold started to leave the room, still talking on the phone.

"Good. Now, here are the instructions…" He closed the door, cutting his voice off.

Lloyd reached over to replace the gag, which he had set down nearby. During this distraction, Goldworth set to work, rubbing the knot around in an effort to pull it apart, trying vaguely to follow the method Lloyd used. Surprisingly, it actually worked, and even before Lloyd was able to look behind him, Goldworth had knocked him on the back of the head with his elbow, knocking him to the floor. He followed by brutally stomping on his back twice, to make sure he wasn't getting up anytime soon.

Harold was unaware anything was going wrong, as he was still negotiating terms with Goldworth's wife. However, he was just finishing up as Goldworth was taking Lloyd's .45 magnum handgun. As he shut the phone and turned around, Goldworth had just primed the gun.

"I'm gonna rich, aren't I…WHAT THE HELL!"

That couldn't be right! Goldworth was free, and had Lloyd's gun? He had prepared for this, in case it became necessary.

He pulled out a similar handgun, and started firing it through the window, immediately shattering it. He made sure he wouldn't hit his retirement plan as much as he possibly could, and only intended them as warning shots. Goldworth didn't get that memo, however, so he fired a shot back, prompting Harold to duck in fear as it hit a light down the hallway, making the other lights flicker. Goldworth fired off a few more shots, and kicked open the door, running down the hallway away from Harold.

"Come back here, you worthless bastard!" Harold demanded, running after him, putting his gun back into his pocket.

At the end of the hallway was a double door opening out into second floor scaffolding of the main warehouse itself, where multiple empty crates still remained on the floor, falling apart from years of disuse. Two staircases led down to the floor, which Goldworth immediately made use of, running down to the lower floor.

About halfway to the bottom, Harold burst out of the doors, and looked around to see if he could find his prey. He quickly spotted him running down the stairs, and fired a shot at his feet. It too was intended as a warning; he couldn't properly collect ransom on a dead body. After all, he had agreed to give Goldworth over to his wife at the same time that he received the hundred million dollars. A corpse would not assist that transaction. He fired another one, and started chasing Goldworth again.

"Damn it!" Goldworth shouted while running down an aisle, mistakenly thinking that Harold was getting serious about this. He tried firing a few shots at his adversary, but he only used one hand, and tried to look backwards while running forwards, so he missed every shot. It seems he was starting to learn that his own movies were somewhat dumb.

"Oh, come on!" He shouted.

He came across an intersection, and went to the left, just because. This turned out to be a disastrous choice, as right in that area was a dead end, with no escape. Goldworth turned around, but was immediately faced with a handgun pointed right at his head.

"Just come with me and be done with it, Goldworth."

"You wouldn't shoot me."

"What makes you say that?"

"Well, I can tell an empty gun when I see one."

Harold looked at his gun, not sure whether or not to trust him. Sure, he directed a lot of action movies, but could he really recognize an empty gun? Was there even anything to indicate it was empty?

That distraction was all Goldworth needed, delivering a high kick straight to Harold's chest, sending him straight to the floor, and his gun to the side. He quickly got back up, though, and got into a vague fighting stance.

"You asked for it!" He shouted. Goldworth merely pointed his gun at him.

"Uh…think fast!" Harold grabbed the gun and pointed it away from both of them, at the same time punching Goldworth in the face, or attempting to, at least; Goldworth deftly blocked the attack with his right forearm, and kicked Harold in the knee, momentarily getting him to release his grip.

In response to this, Goldworth threw his weapon away, and started to unleash a furious storm of punches and kicks onto his kidnapper, quickly leaving him in absolute ruin, squirming on the floor in agony. Thus, as Harold was incapacitated, Goldworth immediately ran past him, towards the exit of the building.

()()()

Once he found himself outside, Goldworth immediately ran for his limousine, forming a plan in his head.

But he didn't have long to think because by the time he got to his limousine, Harold had already gotten up from his beatdown, and was not happy.

"GET BACK HERE!" He demanded, his voice filled with mindless rage.

"Oh, crap!" Goldworth tried to open the door, but of course, it was locked. He realized he had no choice but to harm his own vehicle, and smashed in the window so he could get at the lock. After a moment of grasping around, he opened the door, and quickly got inside. To his surprise, the key was still on top of the dashboard, left carelessly by Harold, apparently. He started the engine, and began to drive off.

"Oh no you don't!" Harold shouted, running even faster.

In an idiotically suicidal action, he jumped onto the limousine, grabbing hold of the trunk handle and using it to pull himself up onto it.

"Get out, you asshole!" He demanded, banging on the roof.

"No!"

Goldworth was starting to pick up speed, and he had finished his brilliant plan. A quick look around showed that a police station was nearby; specifically, a ways to the left of him. An intersection was coming up to him, and he knew his opportunity was now.

"Bye!" He shouted, turning in the right direction.

Harold screamed, and increased his grip on the vehicle, desperate not to fall off. When the turn was completed, he still had his grip, but was quite shaken up, and was more so when he looked up and saw where he was heading: a large, white building with some blue highlights; the city's major police station. A few empty police cars were parked out front, but it seemed that today was a slower one than usual.

"NO!" He cried out, trying desperately to think of what to do.

"Yes!" Goldworth shouted, knowing _exactly_ what he was going to do.

It was then that Harold came up with a vague plan: jump off the limousine and try to run away. Obviously, it was a horrible plan, but it was worth a shot.

He carefully let go, and prepared to leap away, but that was when Goldworth enacted his plot: perform a parallel park next to the station, so Harold would be thrown off. As Goldworth turned the car rapidly to the side, Harold was thrown off of it entirely, slamming against the concrete of the sidewalk and coming to a rest against it. Several of his ribs were broken, along with both of his arms and his left leg.

"Oops." Goldworth said, as he got out and looked at what he had done. He hadn't expected Harold to release his grip on the limousine and try to jump off.

A police officer, hearing the commotion outside, opened the door and looked around.

"What the hell just happened here?" He demanded, not trying to determine it for himself.

"Well," Goldworth began, "He kidnapped me and held me for a ransom, but I was able to escape in my limo, but he grabbed onto it as I was driving away, and then tried to jump off of it, I guess."

The officer just stared at him.

"Well…hold on, aren't you that one director? Goldworth?"

"Yeah, that's me."

"Uh…please come with me, sir, we'll need to sort this out…"

()()()

Within an hour, the police had managed to apprehend Lloyd, who stupidly remained in that same warehouse. As Lloyd could barely speak, the only way to get a confession would be from Harold, who was revealed to be a small-time crook that tried to go for the big money and failed. His injuries were too great, however, and he had to go to the emergency room of the nearest hospital. Once he woke up, only then would police be able to get a confession from him. Until then, Goldworth had to remain in police custody under suspicion until the trial, and was going to be fined for reckless endangerment. He was allowed one phone call, which he used to contact his wife.

"Hi, dear. I'm okay."

"What? How?"

"Well, I was able to escape and get to the police."

"Oh, thank goodness!" The tone in her voice suggested that she wasn't thankful her husband was okay, but rather, she wouldn't have to give somebody 100 million dollars.

"Uh…you would have paid that ransom if I _wasn't_ able to escape, right?"

She hesitated to answer. "Of course, dear! You know that I love you?"

"Sure." He hung up, and was directed back to his cell.

()()()

Well, that's done and over with. Time to finish up the main plot! Well, next week, at least. AwkwardVulpix, over and out.


	19. Missingno Seven: The End

Missingno 7

()()()

"We're doomed." Larch said.

"Well, maybe we can win…" Anne knew that nobody believed that they had a chance, not even herself.

"How?" Larch demanded, raising his voice. "Our Pokemon suck, we don't even know if it's on Cinnabar or if it's following us!"

Just then, the ship's lights cut off, plunging the whole cruise into darkness.

"What the hell was that?" Muldoon yelled.

"Hello, passengers." A robotic voice called out, reaching everywhere at once, even places the intercom couldn't have possibly reached. "As you are aware, power to this ship has been cut entirely. For the next three hours, nothing will work at all. Thank you, and goodbye."

"Oh, damn it!" Larch shouted. "Missingno followed us!"

"We need to get to the bridge and stop it here." Muldoon told them. "If it gets to Cinnabar, all is lost. " "Follow me!" He kicked open the door for no particular reason, and ran to the left in the hallway, heading to the exit leading to the outside deck, pursued by Larch, Anne, and Ralph. The elderly gentleman stayed behind for a few moments, before slowly following as well.

()()()

On the outer deck, most of the people were standing around, wondering why the ship had randomly stopped moving, and why all the machines and devices on the ship had come to a stop. Some people were looking over the side, to see if they were still moving forward.

"Okay, now what?" Anne wondered, looking around for the bridge of the ship.

"The bow!" Larch yelled, pointing towards a large structure at the rear of the ship, which had to be the ship's bridge.

"Wait, isn't the back the stern?" Anne responded.

"I thought that was port." Ralph said.

"No, port is right, isn't it?" Larch continued.

"Why the hell are we doing this?" Muldoon asked. "We need to go, now!"

"Oh crap, you're right!" Anne shouted. "We need to hurry!"

"Wait, hold on!" The old man shouted, running after them. But something was quite thoroughly wrong: his scalp appeared to be coming off!

"Good lord!" Larch asked. "Are you quite alright?"

"Wait a second…" Muldoon said, walking over to the man. "You're an impostor!" he grabbed the man's head, and ripped off the latex bald cap that was secretly covering it, revealing the short brown hair underneath. Next, Muldoon wiped off the makeup on his face, revealing who he truly was: Chris Brady.

"Chris Brady?" Larch shouted angrily. "You've been tricking us this whole time!"

"Freeze! On the floor!" Muldoon turned him around and grabbed his wrists, forcing him to the ground. To keep him there, Muldoon pressed his foot down on Chris' back, completely immobilizing him.

"No, wait, please!" Chris pleaded, using his real voice, "I want to help you!"

Larch looked at him for a few moments, before asking him, "What could you do to help?"

"I did work on that project! I was higher up on it than you, and I know some of its weaknesses!"

"Like what?"

"We made it an experimental type, but it ended up being glitchy. If it does too much at one time without resting, it needs to go into shutdown mode to regain its strength. I think it might be in shutdown right now. And besides, I know the deactivation code. Knowing you, you've forgotten it."

Larch considered this, realizing he _had_ forgotten it. "Very well. But afterwards, we'll turn you into the police."

Chris knew he had no other options. "Fine."

Muldoon pulled away his foot, and glared at Larch. "You'd better be _damn_ sure you know what you're doing."

Larch stared at him for a few moments, before walking off silently.

"If you try anything funny, I'll throw you overboard." Muldoon warned, before following Larch.

Anne and Ralph began to follow, but Muldoon stopped them.

"Stay here. If something goes wrong, we'll need a backup plan."

"But…" Anne tried to object, but Muldoon walked off, holding Chris' arm to prevent an escape attempt. No, not in that way, you weirdo.

()()()

By that time, however, Larch was already at the door leading into the first floor of the bridge. A group of staircases dead center allowed people to get to the top of the bridge, where the captain presided over events, with ease, although it was somewhat more difficult as the room was quite dark without any electricity.

"Well, that was easy enough!" he said, opening the door and walking inside. A guard was sitting within, trying to contact the upper bridge on a two-way radio.

"Hello? Hello? Damn it, this thing is on a battery!" He heard the door slam shut, and looked over to Larch.

"Excuse me, sir, you can't be here. We're encountering difficulties with the power system."

"This is a matter of international security." Larch said, trying to sound like Muldoon, "I'm afraid you don't have a choice."

The guard stared at Larch like he was a madman. "What the hell are you talking about?"

"Oh, forget you." That was when Muldoon and Brady walked in, the former holding out his badge for the guard.

"This is a matter of international security, sir, so if you could allow us to…"

"Yeah, yeah, whatever. I've heard it all. Just…go ahead, you've got the badge…" the guard began to mumble incoherently, as the group of three walked up the stairs to the next level. Well, sort of. About halfway up the stairs, the ship randomly started tipping to the side, just enough to throw them off of their balance.

"What the hell was that?" Chris asked.

"I think Missingno may be shifting around the ballast tanks!" Larch answered. "It must be in complete control of the ship's functions!"

"Please stop yelling." Muldoon asked, as he attempted to walk up the stairs, the ship swaying to the other side this time.

()()()

On the main deck of the ship, things were hardly any better. The swaying of the ship had given most of the passenger's seasickness, whereas some of them were nearly thrown off the side, Ralph and Anne falling into the latter category. They were currently holding onto the railing of the ship, trying to keep their feet firmly planted on the floor.

"What's going on?" Anne wondered.

"I think maybe we hit a wave," Ralph said, trying desperately not to lose his grip.

And then, the ship stopped moving. Okay, not right away; all that happened is that Missingno stopped shifting the ballast tanks.

"Wait…hold on, I think it stopped!" Anne said, letting go of the railing.

"Oh, thank goodness." Ralph did the same, and looked at the bridge, wondering how things were going on inside…

()()()

By the time Missingno had stopped messing with the ballast tanks, the group in the bridge had managed to get on the staircase to floor three, the top floor.

"We're almost there!" Larch said. "Come on!"

The first to reach the top was Muldoon, though, and he opened the door to find that nobody was in the bridge except the unconscious captain.

"What the hell happened here?" Muldoon started looking around, trying to figure out what had transpired in the room. As he was looking around, the lights, out of nowhere, turned back on.

"What the…" Larch was confused. Why would Missingno return power to the ship?

"Hello, Larch." It said, in that typical cold, robotic voice. "Muldoon. Whoever that third person is. You've given chase to me no matter how I attempted to inconvenience you. So now, you must die."

The control panels located around the bridge began sparking, and one of them actually started to melt. Streams of multicolored pixels began leaving them, further ruining the computers.

"What the hell is it doing now?" Muldoon ran back to the other two, nearly getting hit by shrapnel from one computer that randomly exploded.

Chris looked around, and came to a realization: he was the only one who could save the world.

"I'm going to input the code." He walked over to the only computer that was still intact, the one Missingno must have been inhabiting, and started to analyze the controls, as Larch and Muldoon stared on in shock.

"The surge protectors are being overloaded! We're going to die if we stay here! We have to leave, NOW!"

"No." Chris said, as a computer next to him exploded violently, sending shards of glass and metal everywhere. "I have to do this. Save the captain, there's nothing you can do for me."

Larch and Muldoon stared at each other, before doing as he had said. Ducking below the consoles, they crawled over to the unconscious captain, and started trying to wake him up.

"Come on, you idiot!" Muldoon shouted, slapping him across the face. That was enough to finish the job, and he started to get up and walk out.

"Wait, no!" Larch shouted. It was, however, pointless: the captain managed to leave without getting harmed at all. Muldoon ran after him, but Larch stayed for a few moments, looking at Chris.

"Whatever happens to you," Larch said, "I hope it was worth it."

As Chris inputted the complex twenty-digit kill-code, Larch ran away from the collapsing room. Once the last digit had been put in, and Missingno had been deactivated permanently, Chris closed his eyes, waiting as the pixels dissipated and the entire room collapsed in on him…

()()()

On the deck, people were quite shocked to see the top of the bridge collapse entirely, some of them panicking and running for the lifeboats. Especially shocked were Ralph and Anne, still waiting for the three that had entered.

"Oh no…" Anne whispered, fearing the worst. Her fears were dissipated when she saw Larch and Muldoon walking towards them, along with the captain.

"Where's Chris?" Ralph yelled to them.

"He stayed behind." Larch said. "Somebody had to input the code, and I forgot what it was."

"WHAT?" Muldoon yelled. "You forgot! How the hell did we even make it this far? You're the sorriest bunch of incompetent losers I've ever met! I can't even believe that you would do something as _stupid_ as…"

"Oh, shut up." Larch said.

"I guess…we won, then?" Anne wasn't sure if they had or not.

"If Missingno was defeated, then…yes, we did win?" Larch began to laugh. "It's hard to believe. I mean, first what happened last year, and now _this_…just some normal people that got caught up in all of this nonsense."

"I need to go retrieve my crew, if you don't mind." The captain said.

"What?"

"Missingno trapped them in a bunch of PokeBalls, somehow. There are some emergency backup computers, and we'll still be able to steer the ship. We should be arriving at Cinnabar in a few hours once we get the ship back up."

"Well, I suppose then we can rent a boat back to that other island, retrieve our Pokemon, and return home."

The group looked off towards the direction the ship was heading, finally able to rest after so much…

()()()

Next week, I'll have a bonus chapter, and then I'll take a break for the rest of the summer. By the way, I have a poll for my next story when the summer's over. Go check it out, but until then, this has been AwkwardVulpix, over and out.


	20. Bonus Chapter

Bonus Chapter

Well, I said there would be a bonus chapter, and here it is. Warning: if you are a serious competitive Pokemon player, or frequent , you are going to be _pissed_ at me.

()()()

It had been some time since Missingno; not quite a year this time, only about a month. Yet again, the three friends had split up, living their own lives completely independent of each other.

It was the middle of the day, a day that was like any other. There wasn't a cloud in the sky from Larch's perspective due to the curvature of the Earth and, as a consequence, it's atmosphere, and the sun was shining brightly, considering the loss of energy that the travel would have taken. These thoughts and some others were running through Larch's head as he was going for a short walk with Artie and Rembrandt, as well as his most recent capture: Cassandra, his Mienshao. His yet unnamed Shaymin was still at home; Larch still wasn't sure he should parade it around.

"About time I got out of that thing." Rembrandt said, after a long period of silence. "It was getting stuffy in there."

"I could imagine." Larch said, not really paying attention.

"What's that over there?" Artie asked.

"Hm?" Larch looked around until he found what Artie was watching: a balding, overweight man with glasses having a Pokemon battle with a young child of about five. The former was using a Swampert and the latter a mere Rattata.

The child was clearly losing, as his Pokemon was evidently quite injured. The man didn't care, and ordered his Swampert to finish the kid off with Earthquake.

"Earthquake? Are you mad?" Larch shouted, but the man didn't hear. The ground began to shake underneath them quite violently; easily a five or six on the Richter Scale. By the time the attack finished, the Rattata had fainted, prompting the child to start crying.

"Ha!" The man yelled mockingly, pointing at his defeated opponent, "I knew I'd win against that crap team! Nobody beats Benjamin Smogon! Yeah!"

Recalling his defeated Rattata, the child ran off, still bawling his eyes out.

"What the hell is wrong with you?" Larch demanded. "You made that poor child cry!"

"Well, maybe he should have thought of that before he went up against_ my_ ideal team! I won, he lost, end of story!"

Larch knew this type of person: all they cared about was winning. To them, other people, and even their own Pokemon, didn't matter at all.

"Well, I challenge you to a battle."

The man laughed. "Please! With _that_ team? You'll never win against anything, much less _me_."

Larch frowned. "Such insolence. I'll soon shut you up. Here's the trick: I'll use my most recently caught Pokemon against your oldest one."

Benjamin looked at him as if he was utterly mad. "Do you _want_ to completely lose?"

"We'll soon see the result. Rembrandt, Artie, remain here. Cassandra, prepare to fight."

Artie and Rembrandt stepped back as Cassandra got into position in front of Larch.

"You don't have a chance, old man. My moveset is ideal, and my tactics are unmatched. You're going _down._"

Larch smiled. "Your move."

Ben smiled back. "Swampert, use Ice Beam!" The creature opened its mouth, and a blast of freezing cold air flew towards Cassandra.

"Leap away and use a Jump Kick!" Larch commanded. Cassandra leapt entirely over the beam, performed a dual spinning midair frontflip just to show off, and transitioned it into a downwards axe kick to the Swampert's face. It began shouting incoherent curse words, as Cassandra stepped back.

"What? That's cheating!" Ben yelled stomping on the ground like a child.

"How?"

"I…it's…it just_ is_!" Ben's face was starting to get red, and it seemed that if Larch continued steam would literally blow out of his ears.

"Oh, that makes perfect sense." Larch rolled his eyes.

"Forget this!" Ben scrunched up his face as he considered his options. "Earthquake!"

Unfortunately, it couldn't be done. The Swampert had actually been quite hurt by the previous attack, and was having difficulty even standing up. The fact that Ben hadn't bothered to have his Pokemon healed beforehand only compounded the issue.

"Come on, what the hell are you doing? Get up and use Earthquake!"

The Swampert tried to do that, but it remained unable.

"You worthless little…ah, just use Surf or something."

The Swampert knew something like that would be quite difficult, but maybe possible. He opened his mouth, and prepared to let out a blast of water.

"Wait a second…" Ben said, realizing what he had done. "No!"

A huge wave of water erupted from the Swampert's mouth, and Larch knew exactly what to do.

"Leap over it and use Force Palm!"

They say history repeats itself, and it did here. Although this time it wasn't so easy, since the wave went up so high, Cassandra still managed to leap over it, and slam a very powerful psychic blast right onto the Swampert's head, finishing the job quite efficiently.

"No!" Ben said. "I…lost? That's impossible!"

"Not really." Larch said, as Cassandra walked back to Artie and Rembrandt, who were aghast that she managed to completely upstage them. "You have zero connection to any of your Pokemon; all you care about is victory. Yes, victory plays a part in it, certainly, but you're intended to have _fun_ doing it, to. It's kind of the whole point of sport."

Ben stared at him. "You…oh, man." He put his hand to his forehead, and sat down on the grass. "You're right. I _should_ have cared about my team, but…I didn't…"

"Perhaps it's not too late. Now, if you'll excuse me, I was having a short walk."

Larch turned around, and walked off without saying another word, his Pokemon following him.

()()()

Well, that's the bonus chapter AKA a shameless attempt for me to pad out the length and hit 30K words. Until the end of the summer, this has been AwkwardVulpix, over and out.

Larch's Mienshao: Aura Sphere, Jump Kick, Force Palm, Double Slap

Smogon's Swampert: Stealth Rock, Earthquake, Ice Beam, Surf


End file.
